Journal Entry 12

Chapters

Broken Boundaries or Unclear Boundaries?

I can’t remember the last time that I’ve ever yelled at someone. I’m not that type of person to scream at someone if they do something to make me angry. Sure, I’ll raise my voice and make sure that people know that they’re crossing a boundary but it will never get to the point where I’m screaming at the top of my lungs.

It’s not the best idea to scream at people because all it does is cause a chain of problems. People will start yelling over each other to get their points across and in the end, nothing is solved and you are left with two angry people who have just worsened their relationship.

This week was the first time I yelled at people, though. Those people were my mom and the relatives I was staying with. They constantly pestered and nit-picked me with everything I did around the house. One example would be how I prefer eating baozi without a plate and just eat with my hands around the kitchen. I understand how for some people, it would tick them off because crumbs can get all over the floor. However, baozi tends to not be a crumb-producing food and maybe if it was a cookie/cracker, I would understand someone yelling at me. They were constantly saying how I’m such a little brat for whatever reason and other gossip on the speaker phone and it pissed the FUCK out of me. I didn’t want to say anything because it wasn’t going to shut them up and I didn’t want to fall for the ragebait. BUT, the gossip slowly got to a point, while I was in the dining room trying to do some work, where I exploded and screamed at them. They kept on RAMBLING and RAMBLING. At the same time, it felt really relieving to finally be able to scream at people who I thought deserved it for constantly running their mouth about me.

Now, a part of me also didn’t feel great because that was the first time that I’ve exploded in such a long time. Screaming feels very wrong to me, but there were a few things I realized from this interaction. The first question I was thinking was: who exactly was in the wrong? Did they cross my boundaries and I reacted accordingly to that fact? Or did I never communicate my boundaries in the first place? Regardless of the answers to those questions, the healthier thing that I should’ve done was to tell them to stop gossiping so much before letting my resentment buildup to the point where I felt like I had to scream. But at the same time, maybe I didn’t feel comfortable communicating that boundary because they never directly addressed me in the gossip, but rather talked around me. Maybe, they just aren’t very compatible people for me to be around.

This is something I definitely need to be more cautious with because exploding and screaming is not healthy at all. Someone told me that I wouldn’t seem like a good roommate to have and it’s lived rent-free in my mind ever since. This past week, I’ve been trying to diagnose my particular issues and clarify what specific boundaries I need in order to thrive as a person and how I could become a better roommate. I’ve come to the conclusion that I simply don’t agree with that statement. Maybe having a lot of boundaries doesn’t automatically make me a bad roommate, but I do need to figure out which ones are reasonable and learn to communicate them before I get resentful.

Two things that I realized I need are personal space and a more equal power dynamic. Back at home, my mom would never lecture me about how I lived whatsoever. I had all the freedom to live however I wanted to. Here at my relative’s house, it feels so much different. I have little to no freedom to live my own lifestyle, and that slowly leads to the build up of resentment. Just imagine having someone constantly breathe down your neck about how you live and go about life. It creates an imbalanced power dynamic where I’m constantly on the lower end. Living in a dorm room with someone else would allow me to be in a more equal power dynamic with my roommate. It would allow me to communicate my own boundaries that I feel are quite reasonable.

Right now, I think I need some space to let the resentment calm down. This resentment has been ruining my mood the entire week and that is not a good thing. Maybe functionally, I work better alone or maybe, I just haven’t found my type of people. Who knows? I clearly don’t. I’ve always wondered how people can get so angry at each other and this week I finally found my answer. There are still so many situations I haven’t experienced yet that will probably force me to learn more about myself and improve as a person. It’s only a matter of time before I have to challenge them head-on and face ugly versions of myself.

Cyclical Boredom and Loneliness

Silence.

It’s so quiet. I haven’t made much progress in making a close friendship. I haven’t had much, if any, social interaction with people outside my family. It’s bothering me a lot. When I sit alone in a room and think about it, I don’t have many close friends. I crave social interaction and despite this fact, I don’t really get much of it. I don’t have a group chat. I don’t have friends who reach out to me often. I seem to live in a world all by myself. But why? I care so much about other people but do they care about me? I’ve written about this issue before because it keeps bothering me. It’s a problem I can’t diagnose because I don’t really know what the issue is in the first place. What do I have to do exactly to make those close friendships? Do I have to care more about other people? Have I just not been in an environment to make those friendships? Am I not taking the right steps to make those friendships? Has my time just not come yet? Or worse, am I just too weird of a person?

When I look out the window, life looks gray and dull. Even sitting on the couch and doomscrolling doesn’t put my mind at ease whatsoever. They said college would be a really great experience but as each day passes, I become more and more doubtful. I was confident that I would be able to find a lot of good friends. I was confident that I would be able to adapt socially. I was confident that college would be really fun. That confidence is now slowly fading.