I love to swim. On some days all I want to do is be around a pool and swim until I can no longer move. Some days the only thing I can think about is how nice it would be to feel the water, so I'll decide I'm going to go to practice that day and I will help teach swim lessons after, and for the day it will be wonderful. I'll get out of the water feeling exhausted and content, ready to do it again the next day. The days I want to swim, I have energy.

Then there are other days when the only reason I go to the pool is so my coach doesn't yell at me. I make it through the work out simply because I don't want to feel like a disappointment to my coaches or my team mates. I avoid them in the locker room on those days and usually go home with tears in my eyes, not wanting to see another pool for months. Sometimes I stay like that for a few days at a time, weeks even, until again I get the bright and strong desire to be near water and I gain motivation from a taxing work out instead of feeling destroyed.

I don't know why I can't find a median between the two. I don't understand why I can't love the pool everyday, or hate it everyday.

I have a problem with people. I'm shaking from writing this post currently because even though I write in a journal almost daily, I never write as an overview. I never share what I don't think people will understand or care about. When I'm with a group of people for more than an hour or so, I feel the need to leave the room. I don't necessarily get anxious, I just no longer want to be there. I've had times when I'm with four or five very good, friendly acquaintances, and I'll walk out without saying anything, without a cause besides wanting to be away from them. And not even to be away from them necessarily, because sometimes one will follow and that will be just fine. I thought I was just shy until I began realizing that these were good friends that I trusted perfectly fine when dealing with them one-on-one. Then suddenly mixing a few together and i feel fidgety and restless and uncomfortable.

Sometimes I feel like I'm manipulative. I can't describe how, but I know I am. I do things like crack over a situation that doesn't mean a thing. Example: My boyfriend forgets to call when he says he would. My Response: I feel a grudge against him as if him forgetting to call means he doesn't care about me, then will continually act sour against him for the remaining time I'm with him even after he apologizes profusely. When I think about it later, I think how stupid it was and how terrible I made him feel about such a little thing.

And I do things like this to everyone-- I'd like to believe I learned it from my dad and didn't just start doing it on my own. He has behaviors and periods where he behaves very similar to me. But just like with me, it's only on certain days. I still remember the time when he tipped our dinning room table over to clear it off just because my sister had been eating on the couch and spilled on her shirt. He didn't clean it up-- just told her and everyone else to sit at the table and eat. Other days he's charismatic and nice and I am so grateful to have him as a father. I have to wonder if other people feel the same way about me. And if they did, I'm pretty sure I'd deserve it because I do blow some things way out of proportion and make people feel terrible about something that doesn't matter.

I've come to realize that the days I get on everyone's case are also the days I don't have the energy to be near a pool. It's like I've created a coping mechanism; by criticizing everyone I see, I can avoid feeling pathetic about my own situation. I don't want to end up like my dad, diagnosed with Manic Depression at the age of 56. But I'm not sure what's wrong, so I don't know how to fix it. I keep telling myself, "You will go to the pool tomorrow no matter how You feel and You will enjoy it, dammit. Suck it up." But things like that only make me feel...

[ Continued ]

Depression can really suck, especially if you spend your day sitting in your room doing nothing. The happiness triangle consist of three different things in life that everyone needs.

Guess what those three things have in common? They make you happy! Read on for more information on what the happiness triangle is and how you can apply it to your life.

So, is it really that bad to just sit in your room all day and do nothing?

The answer is YES! That is very much so a bad thing! Let me talk to you about something I learned in high school called “The Happiness Triangle“.

The happiness triangle consists of 3 things:

Something to do
Something to look forward to
Someone to love

After you find these three things, you will be much happier in life. Let’s discuss all 3 of them individually, starting off with something to do.

If you sit around all day doing absolutely nothing, of course you’ll be depressed! And it’s not just finding something to do, it’s finding something constructive to do. And for all of you depressed pot heads out there, GETTING HIGH IS NOT A CONSTRUCTIVE WAY TO SPEND YOUR TIME! Sorry, I had to get that out of my system.

Here are a few suggestions:

Learning a musical instrument
Painting or Drawing
Cooking
Going to school
Getting a job
Reading
Writing
Starting a collection
Volunteer somewhere
Help out around the house
Get a pet
The secret is: Go out and do something with your life! Make changes if you aren’t happy with the life you are living right now!

To find something constructive to do, you have to make sure it passes what I like to call “The Constructiveness Test”. Does it make you happy? Do you enjoy doing it? Will it help you or someone else learn something? Will it harm anyone in any way, shape, or form? After you have found something worthwhile to do, you can move on to the tougher parts of the happiness triangle.

The next part of the happiness triangle kinda ties in with the first part. Finding something in your life to look forward to! Where are you going in life? What is it you really want to be? Where do you want to be in 5 years?

Basically, set some goals! Here are some more suggestions:

Write a book – If you have a lap top, just start writing something in a blog or word document.
Lose Weight - Get gym membership or you can even go get your own set of exercise equipment
Get a job, if you already have a job get a second job
Go to college
Get a good relationship with your family
Grow a garden
Travel somewhere you’ve always wanted to go
Making goals can really help motivate you to get out and do something with your life. Life is what you make it, a college degree isn’t going to show up on your doorstep. You have to go out and earn it! If you want a happy life, you have to do things in your life that make you happy. It’s that simple.

The next and last part of the happiness triangle is having someone to love. Most causes of depression have something to do with losing someone in their lives such as a family member, close friend, lover, or any other type of loved one.

Most people don’t feel comfortable about it, but getting counseling can really help you to deal with loss. Lots of people go to counseling; If you think you can’t deal with something by yourself, that’s nothing to be ashamed of.

If you feel that you have a problem with getting a date, try joining a dating website. There are MILLIONS of people online! Go and make a few profiles, put up a real picture of yourself, and explain a little bit about yourself and your life. Don’t reveal any person information such as your address or phone number!

No one is alone in this world, and if they are.. then it is their own choice. Even homeless people have friends.

Depression is a hard thing to live with, but guess what? You really don’t have to live with it if you don’t want to! This big beautiful world is our playground to explore. Get out there and live your life, no one else is going to live it for you!

Hello Today I am writing about that strange attitude which I face in my life. I was feeling that due to some wrong decision a big revenge would take birth and create problems for me but in practical sense I am facing that at current position. I started working after I left school but sometimes I feel I should went to the regular college and enjoy with my friends and make my life as enjoyable as I can, but life didn’t accept that, due to my personal and financial problems I started and chosen to work my best and set an aim to earn money. I know that money is not everything but I still thought that might choosing college life from official life would be more enjoyable. Restriction is a small word but has bigger meaning. Today I am just restricted in my limitations which bound me in a particular situation and to follow always the same route. life turns like shifting hell from heaven but I might keep Suring myself that destiny would gave something good and new in future I just hope that changing in life might keep me happy. It’s a life nature to change his attitude his behavior after time to time but nobody knows how it would return in what manner. This situation always bound me and force to think more and more and I got tensed that my future is not secure if I walk like this. Hope someday I got chance to change my life attitude and make it as enjoyable as I can so that there should be no problem, no worries just a life with cool attitude which I want to live.

Thanks & Regards
Rohit

i feel like i need to tell my whole life story so that you can better understand and help me understand if i have been and still am being verbally/mentally abused... I'll try to make it not too long.
My name is Christina i am 21 years old right now and lets see growing up my mom worked multiple jobs to keep a roof over our head , while my father did drugs, cheated on her , and was in and out of our lives consistently. My father somehow convinced my mother to move to the bitch's (excuse my language) house that he was cheating on her with. I was maybe 5 or 6 when we moved, I was sexually molested by her older son who was 9 years older than me, i knew this when i got older and i figured its to late to tell anyone so i just kept it in.
My aunt is like my second mom, when i was growing up she was ALWAYS there for me, she played with me, cared for me, loved me but some how everything started to change.. i felt like our relationship became like a toxic war and i was her target. She would pin point the littlest things out to just lecture me and break me down. i was a child and it would feel like she would take pleasure in watching the fear in my eyes and the tears rolling down my face. I felt like i was nothing.
I was 11 the first time i tried to kill myself. It was fourth of July and all the kids (cousins) were at her house, i remember it so clearly as if it was yesterday. she was fine having fun, laughing with us , playing with us and i don't know what happened but something just triggered her and she just started "lecturing" (as she puts it) me and she wouldn't stop not until i literally made myself cry so hard that i had to vomit. Even after puking i was still getting bitched at "you're good for nothing, i cant stand you and what stress you put me under" . So after she stopped she went to her room and went to sleep like a little baby while i was sitting in a corner contemplating whether i should just save myself now from this monster. so i went inside and took whatever pills i could and i grabbed a knife and started cutting myself; OUTSIDE because i didn't want to make a mess.
I honestly have grown to resent her but i am so close to my family that i cant see myself cutting ties. I know this isn't a healthy relationship i have with her and i know she isn't a bad person, because shes not like this with anyone else...just me. she makes me feel worthless. we live in the same house and we barely speak two words to each other, i can feel the resentment she has towards me.
I am a very strong individual and i speak my mind i don't let anyone take advantage of me or my loved ones but when it comes to my aunt i feel like she has complete power over me . i want to confront her and tell her she fxkin crazy && needs help but i know she will only turn it around to be put on me and i honestly don't have the emotional strength to deal with her. From the age of 9 until today i have been dealing with manipulating abusive ways and i seriously don't know how to handle it.

As a consequence of lacking a concrete sense of self, for some reason, I find myself wanting to be too many things; things which I am not or can't really be, and may even contradict each other. Especially around the time I am exposed to those things, I become attached to them and build fantasies around them, but this only lasts for a brief period of time until they are replaced by nothing, or by something else.

For example, if I watch a movie with a character that stands out in some way, and whose personality and general presence I can somehow appreciate, I end up wanting to emulate that character or their environment. My fundamental beliefs about things begin to waver and then I start to not know what is mine and what is stolen from the character or the setting or whatever else.

This happens with all sorts of things, not just people. If I listen to music, I want to create music, if I read books, I want to write books. If I watch moves I want to make movies, and if I play games I want to design games. The problem is that I don't really have these interests when I am not constantly exposed to them. The drive is reflexive and not innate.

So I do too many things and never enough of them. I start too many things but never finish. And in the same sense, with my personality, I am attempting to be or become too many things at the same time, and the failure to do so only leaves me with frustration and pain. I feel incapable of being something, if anything, because I can never focus on one thing long enough to be it.