Tell me there's a moment for me

Ah, that new semester smell. All the world's filled with possibilities and the reality of work does not lay on my back lie a two-ton rhino with a vendetta. And I have that oh-so-faintly possible hope that I might this semester actually work hard and keep on top of things. On the plus side, mentally, physically, socially, spiritually I have never (or almost never) felt better. On the minus side, I'm taking 6 classes (although 2 of which are with professors I know to be tough but interesting and fair), I'm dealing with a Princeton Review class (although that should end mid-February), I'm trying to up my writing skills and improve this webpost, I'm involved with the Rutgers Indian Christian Fellowship (who I kind of neglected last semester, unfortunately) and WRSU, as well as any other clubs I might pick up an interest in, furthermore, I had hoisted upon me the presidency of my Malankara Catholic church youth group, and I'm trying to maintain and if possible improve my social life. Looming over everything is my search for a new job and the planning I need to do for after graduation.

But calming down a bit, all those things seem feasible. Classes don't take up that much time, the P. Review classes are only 3-6 hours each weekend, the youth group presidency is lessened by the low-expectations due to our youth group's chronic inactivity, a social life once in motion tends to stay in motion and I've been getting help from a variety of sources in my job search. Moreover, on the writing side, I'm getting more discipline and finding that creativity is following the demand for work.

So things are seeming good, yet that statement always carries a little bit of terror with it. If things are good now, is the collapse of the current situation a simple inevitablity. Afterall my mental illness moves in cycles (I'm trying to simplify my search topics that you see at the bottom of the post, so in the future all my posts about mental illness will be under the topic mental health), and so what if I'm just on an up-swing. Hasn't all my past suggested that I cannot maintain good times?

Undoubtably I'm going to suffer some bad times sometime in the future, but that's simply a reflection that I've got a long future left (it's odd, about a year ago I was so worried about my mental illness that I was convinced that I was unlikely to make 30, but nowadays I actually believe in my future which probably is a very good sign). But I think I've learned from the past, and my mental abilities (some of them, although I wonder sometimes what my mental abilities would be like if I had no disease and didn't have to take medication (mental illness medication tends to cause side effects that dampen some mental abilities, I think before I started taking medication I could read faster and remember more, but then again my depression screwed up a whole lot of my mental abilities, and moreover through repeated effort I think my thinking skills are once again grade A, and anything my med.s have cost has been more than made up due to the lessening of my depressive and suicidal impulses), my coping skills, and my spiritual depth (although I don't want to claim some special spiritual gift, I am a man of devout faith and I am proud of my faith however large or small it may be in the ultimate measurement) (some people will say "I have no regrets" but I think that expression can't be taken literally, everyone has times in the past when they acted last than perfectly, yet I think what that expression really means is that they are proud of who they are now, and so they would not want to lose that by messing with their past, and so by that reckoning I have no regrets (probably)), have I think been increased, and so maybe I will face bad times, but maybe I won't be destroyed by them, maybe the next time crises hit me on the left and on the right I will avoid crumpling into a ball of intense depression.

Afterall I am RAND!!!! But more seriously, the future is always an undiscovered country, to paraphrase Star Trek VI (a very good movie if you ask me, and you should ask me, because I am RAND!!!), and I believe that while the past can foreshadow our difficulties, it does not predestine us. Furthermore, as a man of devout faith, as I have said before, I think that even the destiny that our traits and circumstances may make likely can be moved through the will of God. So my point is we are not bound by our past, and maybe I will slip into depression again, but maybe then I will become even better at dealing with my disease and with life in general and maybe then I will be able to resist any depressions after that or maybe...

Maybe, no mater what depressions I might face, I will still live my life in a fashion I can be proud of, in pursuit of rightousness, and with a heart that believes completely and utterly in God and His everylasting Love.

And maybe then, chasing the ideal above all ideals, I will rise above my past. Maybe even though I am a boat against the current borne back by the tides of the past, maybe even those tides can be navigated or broken to allow me to reach the furthest sea (drawing for this analogy from The Great Gatsby and maybe some other works of literature that is dancing about in my mind (I think the furthest sea comes from some place or other)).

Anyways, before I get too serious, let me remind you all that orange juice is a good juice and you should drink more of it (and people shouldn't manufacture watered down orange juice, I mean I admit that for shipping reasons you need concentrate, but some of the watery crap that people sell in stores... it just ain't no good, it just ain't no good).

So anywho, take it to your head, take it to your hearts, and remember Rand rocks. Goodnight Folks! (I'm wondering if I should end with God Bless! instead of Goodnight Folks!, God Bless! is a good sentiment, but it sort of pegs my webpost, perhaps unfairly, as completely religious and while I like to think I talk without fear about my religion here, I also talk of other matters and so perhaps the more secular Goodnight Folks! is more appropriate, I could do both but on a regular basis that seems too bulk. Oh well, for today let me say Goodnight Folks and God Bless!