Nothing Sharpens Sight Like Envy

One of the seven deadly sins.

The green eyed monster.

Pure, intense jealousy.

“Love sees sharply, hatred sees even more sharp, but jealousy sees the sharpest for it is love and hate at the same time.”

Jealousy is not a quality that would logically appear in a woman of confidence. As humans, however, it is a common vice that so many of us share. It is created from desire and insecurity and fear. Why are we constantly wanting what we do not have? Because we may never have it? Because someone else already does? Men and women are individuals without ownership, not pieces of property. Yet, how is it that the pure evil feeling of intense jealousy may arise at the mere idea of losing a lover or crush to another? Is jealousy nothing more than the fear of abandonment? The fear of loss?

"Jealousy is all the fun you think they had."

Envy is running through my veins. I could be a crayon, I'm so green with it. Jealousy is more than a small want or insecurity - jealousy is rage. It is hatred. It is fury. It's so green that it's black with disgust. I could vomit.

And how is it that this feeling can even come about from mere desire? I rarely "put my eggs in one basket" - but I suppose it's the savage beast in me that must fight for survival. I've become a wild animal fighting for my prey. Is he even worth the fight? Is the juice worth the squeeze? A loss here would be a small one - nobody is that special. He's certainly not. Still, it's the envy in me that fumes with rage and anger and confusion. I deserve the best. I know what is best, right?

Here and now, will I become the wild animal fighting for prey or will I remember that I must leave the fighting to my suitors? Jealousy can't be all the fun I think they had, because they would have had even more fun with me. I'm the most fun. Be jealous.

6 Month Blog Vaycay

Six long months since I've written anything... Guess I fail at the blog thing... But, hey, it's not like I haven't been writing. I've written a ton. Mostly monologues and short plays and the beginnings of long plays that I don't finish. I'll finish something someday.

One of my monologues was selected for LMU's New Works Festival in the spring. I'm pretty excited, even though they chose a really weird one that I submitted. If you check it out, you'll see what it's about.

Getting Carried Away

After much anticipation, Sex & The City 2 finally came out on the big screen. The iconic HBO television show is a personal favorite, and I must admit that I recently re-watched all six seasons. The first film was magnificent. I saw it three times in theaters and cried about eight

times during the first viewing and still cry from all sorts of overwhelming emotions that only my favorite New Yorkers can deliver. To this day, I can hardly bear to watch Mr. Big stand Carrie up on her wedding day, but in the end it all works out in a very fantastic, yet realistic, finish. I cannot say this about the film’s recent sequel.

Yes, SATC2 had all of the glitz and glamour and glitter that I could have hoped for... and that’s about it. The writing made the television show witty and unforgettable, but it was the writing that completely destroyed my high hopes for this film. All it took was the first line of the movie to sink my heart – beads? Really, Carrie? You’re opening your sequel by talking about beads? I’m sorry… but no. WTF!? Yes, the movie had some of my favorite female characters of all time and yes, there were select hilarious moments, but the movie bared little resemblance to the beloved television show we all fell in love with. Absolutely everything in the plot was extraordinarily over-the-top. Too much over-the-top. Like Disneyland for adults on ecstasy over-the-top. I could handle the extravagant (but hilarious) Liza Minnelli wedding performance, I could deal with the really hot lesbian nanny that doesn’t wear a bra, and the black diamond that Big gives Carrie at the end because she’s “unlike any other woman.” I could maybe even support the complimentary trip to Abu-Dhabi, because, let’s face it, if Samantha Jones can’t do it then who can? I put up with those glittery fantasies, because they were lively, comical and didn’t totally push my buttons. I could not, however, comfortably sit through the horrible and completely uncreative karaoke song choice or the Muslim women wearing crazy high fashion outfits underneath their burkas in 100+ degree weather. I get that the sequel was trying to emphasize women empowerment, which I'm all for, but it was cheesy and way too cliche. The karaoke scene actually almost ruined it for me. The only thing that made me ever want to see this movie again was the hotter than hot, sex on a stick, hunky men – deliciously dapper Nicky (Noah Mills) and the unforgettably orgasmic Rikard Spirit (Max Ryan)... Um, like, I don’t even know what else to say because just the mere thought of Mr. Max Ryan has me biting my bottom lip in sexual frustration. Hot damn.

All in all, the sequel got a little too “Carried away.”

I give it a generous C

... And A Happy New Year

Oh hey sup!? Gosh I'm so on top of this blog thing right? Haha NOT.

I suppose I haven't been all that inspired like my last posts. It's kind of hard to write about something better than a life revelation. I received quite a bit of positive feedback on that last post - made me feel special. I mean, it's awesome to make something meaningful for someone, but I'm pretty stoked if people actually read my words. Makes me feel somewhat relevant, I guess.

It's surprising to me how much life can change in a matter of months. I love LA, it's treating me well. I'm still back in the bay for winter break with one more week left. I'm ready to go back. My real friends here are actually pretty cool, I love them, but people change. We grow up. We mature. We discover who we really are and what we want in our lives. It's intriguing to me that even though I've barely been home a month, I'm dying to get back to Los Angeles. Back to my friends that I've become so attached to. They're my family. A new family. I've never experienced friendships that have come so naturally.

“There comes a point in your life when you realize who matters, who never did, who won’t anymore, and who always will. So don’t worry about people from your past, there’s a reason they didn’t make it to your future”

And the thing is - I don't care about the majority of the people here anymore. DGAF. That quote up there has never made more sense. The only real explanation for that, I guess, is that most of them don't matter. Why should they? I'm sure they matter to other people, or at least on a smaller scale, but they certainly don't matter to me like they did in high school or even a year ago. It's sad how small the list is of people I actually wanted to see this break. I almost feel guilty, even though I have no reason to maintain fake friendships. I'm not going to ask to hang out with someone unless I genuinely want to right? It would be a waste of time.

2010. A new year - a new decade. Resolutions? Maybe. I mean, we've all got the "lose 20 lbs, get in shape, be a better person" bullshit right? Right. It's true though, I do want to get in shape. Need to. And I'm trying to be a better person even though I'm not really sure what that means. Staying positive is important. Staying true to self. It's tricky because I tried doing the whole "be a better person" thing a while ago and I was too damn nice. People took advantage. People that I have cut out of my life - another resolution? Oh oh oh and exciting news - I'm going to dye my hair a dark brown this year. Drastic change. I wore a dark brown wig on Halloween and the positive responses were phenomenal. I was going to do it this week, but I'm not sure when I'll get the guts to do it. It will happen at some point in 2010. If not this month, I will wait until some time after my April birthday. I think I want to be blonde for my birthday.

God I miss LA.

Don't get me wrong, I love San Francisco - it has this romantic quality that Los Angeles lacks. My heart will always be in San Francisco. There's just something about LA. Maybe it's because I've lived places that I couldn't wait to get out of so I just appreciate being somewhere I want to be. Maybe it's the weather. Maybe it's the palm trees. Maybe it's being 5 minutes from the beach or always having something to do. LA isn't perfect and neither are the people - there's just something about it.

My apologies for this post, I didn't exactly have much direction - just felt like I had to update on life and living. Hope anyone reading this has a happy and healthy new year.

Carpe Diem.

Hakuna Matata.

Vivre Sa Vie.

A Little Fall of Rain

Stormy weather is hitting the Golden State and showers are in effect across Los Angeles. It's the first real rain I've seen since relocating to sunny SoCal. In a way, it makes me feel closer to home - closer to the damp autumns seen in the San Francisco area. I miss it. This time last year, I was constantly in the city every week. San Francisco is so beautiful in the fall.

I've always despised the rain - until now. I'm not exactly a huge fan of the cold or the wind or the wetness. I prefer the sun, but who doesn't? The rain can be so depressing sometimes. That's the key word - can. Really, the rain is whatever you make of it. Make the best of it.

Tuesdays are the days I usually run all of my errands. Groceries. Mail. Prescriptions. You get the point. This particular Tuesday, I had to return something at the Apple Store in Santa Monica. The whole return process took about 5 minutes - but I have a crush on Santa Monica so I didn't just want to leave so soon after arriving. I shopped around. Walked all along the 3rd street promenade. It wasn't enough.

The streets of Santa Monica were somewhat empty, most likely due to the weather. I found that this vacancy gave me the opportunity to enjoy the location in solitude and self-reflection. So naturally, I went for a walk. I'm not really that crazy for wanting to walk in the rain. It's just a little water. A little spontaneity. It's always good to do something spontaneous and original every once in a while - it keeps you, well, you. My destination was set: the end of the Santa Monica Pier.

I was one of the only people walking to the pier, everyone seemed to be leaving. As I passed the deserted rides and cafes, it began to pour - it was magnificent. Everyone had their umbrellas or ponchos or hooded windbreakers - and if they didn't, they were running for cover. That is, everyone except me. I was soaked and it was uncomfortable at first, but I couldn't just stop and give up and turn around like the rest of them. I walked to the end. I walked to the very end of the pier and I stopped and watched the ocean. Talk about self-discovery. Self-discovery I can't even describe in detail. Stormy sky and waters seem depressing and angry to so many people, but this was one of the most beautiful sights I've ever seen. I felt each drop of rain on my face and I stood there and took it in and reveled in how amazing it is to be alive, to witness the artistry of nature, to feel rain. There is always beauty and life in every storm, we just have to look for it.

It made me think, what kind of person will I be when it rains? Will I run for cover and complain about it, or will I dance in it? Valuing life isn't only about appreciating the good times and the sunshine, but it is about seeing the good that comes from the storm and running with it.

You've gotta have rain to make a rainbow...

Without rain, nothing would grow.

Raising The Stakes

As cheesy as it may sound, ever since I was a little girl, I've wanted to make movies. I wanted to be an actor. I wanted to be a director. I wanted to make costumes. I wanted to write. I wanted to do it all. I still want to do it all and that is exactly what I'm currently trying to do... sort of. I wish that film majors had an acting specialty, but since there isn't one, I decided to major in theatre. Now, I love the theatre - I'm especially enthralled by the history of theatre in ancient Greek and Roman times. But my passion is film, and it is in film where I want to make my career as well as my craft.

I'm enrolled in a scene study course at my university, instructed by Graham Beckel, the actor. I'd consider him a successful Hollywood actor, seeing as he's been in a plethora of projects such as Brokeback Mountain, Pearl Harbor, and a ton of guest spots on different television shows. Anyways, I respect him immensely not only as an actor, but as a teacher. He is incredibly badass - I've never met anyone like him. So anyway, I'm in the most fun class on campus, right? And we've done monologues and we're just beginning our scenes with our partners and from the beginning he's always said this one phrase and it's really becoming embedded in my brain:

"It's not the line, it's the life."

It's not the line... it's the life. Words of wisdom that couldn't be more true. In class today, we watched that scene from Sophie's Choice. You know the scene. The scene everybody hates watching because it is so incredibly painful. Graham likes to call it the "cumshot" of the whole

movie. Yeah, that scene. So the lines in the scene that the godly Meryl Streep says are pretty basic (even though they're in German). It's pretty much "no, I can't choose, don't make me choose, blah, blah, blah." I mean, I don't think I'm wrong in saying that's not exactly complex... Anyway, I cry every single time I watch it. And it's not because of the lines - it's because of the life. I can feel the horror and the drama of the situation because Meryl Streep is so honest and real. Like, this woman is being forced to choose which of her children lives and which one dies. FUCK, it's so intense. And the stakes are so high - which brings up another lesson of the wise Mr. Beckel - raising the stakes.

The stakes are pretty much what make a scene. It's like that whole über-want thing. Nothing is casual. If it's casual, it's boring, and who is going to watch something that is boring? Nobody, that's who. So, stakes must be raised. I'm working on this scene right now from John Patrick Shanley's "Savage in Limbo." It's sort of funny, but super intense. My scene partner is a friend of mine and she's playing Linda. After an extreme rough draft performance of our scene, we kept being reminded of the stakes. The stakes. And Linda's stakes are pretty simple, I think. She just has to keep her boyfriend because that's all that really matters and blah, blah, blah. I, however, am playing Denise Savage and I think her stakes are a little bit more complicated. So that's what I need to do - figure out what her stakes are and raise them.

In this particular scene, Denise - a loud woman in the Bronx - reveals to her old classmate Linda that she is still a virgin. But the stakes aren't just that she wants to lose her virginity - it's nowhere near that simple. She needs to succeed in a relationship. Every single relationship she's ever had has clearly never had any success because if it did, she would've lost her virginity eventually, right?

And she states that she wasn't holding out for just some guy, and the option has always been there for her to lose it and she doesn't want to take that road. So clearly, the sex isn't the real problem - the problem is her inability to have a successful relationship. Also in the scene, she basically admits that she doesn't have many friends and is not very good at friendships - so it's not just successful romantic relationships she is failing at, but friendships as well. Now, my problem is figuring out what her stakes are in this scene. From my perspective, she doesn't have anything to lose until later in the play. She doesn't have any real friends and her love life is non-existent. The only real thing is that she has all of these emotions about ideas and love and her emptiness and has never expressed them and they're finally coming out. But why are her stakes so high? Maybe they're high because she's finally opening up to someone she hasn't been very close with? She's finally sharing herself with someone, which could be something she's been unable to do in the past, and a reason why she's had so many failed relationships. She practically barricades herself in her apartment with her sick mother - hiding from the real world and real relationships. I feel like I can understand her frustrations but I'm having trouble with the stakes because I don't see that she has anything to lose. Maybe she's afraid to lose herself?

I've gotta raise the stakes. I think I need to raise the stakes in life too - but that's an area far too complex for me to even dive into right now.

It's not the line, it's the life.

Living With Panic Disorder

It's been months since I first started this blog, and I never knew what it was going to become. I guess I assumed people would actually read it, or a common theme would come out of it. Maybe it just became a public outlet for me to write. Though it may not look like it on here, I actually write a lot. Almost daily.

I have a book. It's my book. Some people might call it a journal or a diary and maybe it is. I mean, that is what it is, but I don't like calling it that. It sounds incredibly childish and superficial and stupid. It's not like "Dear Diary, this is my super secret crush blah, blah, blah..." or anything. Well, that's a lie. Of course I write about love and my romantic endeavors and fantasies, but I write about everything. I write about it all. I write about the things I could never tell a soul, things so painful that just thinking about them now brings tears to my eyes. I draw little pictures. I scribble when I'm angry. I doodle when I'm in love. It's my book. It's my book. Sometimes, I feel like it has powers of its own and it knows things I don't. Things about life; about the whole universe. I've put so many emotions, so many stories and so much of myself onto its pages that this book has honestly become a part of me. When the pages are full, I will start a new book, but it has been about four years, and it isn't full yet. It's a big book.

I guess part of the reason my book is so important is because I have panic disorder. Over the years, I've been diagnosed with a myriad of little messy psychological disturbances, but panic disorder is the one that has been in full swing for a while. I've learned that writing (like this) calms me down tremendously. It's a way that I can let out every emotion and every thought - thoughts and emotions I can't necessarily say out loud or share with the public - which is why my book is so important. However, there are a lot of things I don't have a problem with sharing - I don't have too many secrets. So, since I'm doing my best to currently come down from an attack, I'm writing here and discussing my issue. Take it or leave it.

To begin, what is panic disorder? Well, to my understanding, panic disorder is an anxiety disorder. When you have panic disorder, you get frequent panic attacks - some are random, some are sparked by something like a phobia. Over the past two years, I've noticed some of my worst panic attacks have been socially triggered. Sure, many are random, but most come with social backing. When I realized this, I was surprised because I'm an incredibly social person. At least, that's what I've always thought. Let's face it, I love to talk - it's a problem. I talk way too much for my own good. I love making new friends and dancing and going to parties. I'm outgoing. This makes me a social person right? Well, not really. I think I talk too much when I'm nervous, and the meeting people and dancing is just surface stuff. I think inside, I'm much more private than I want to believe. I've realized that there is a large part of me that is secretly self-conscious and nervous and shy and so afraid and so paranoid and so irrational - and this is where my socially triggered panic attacks start. I think I've located the source.

I remember the night I realized my panic attacks were beginning to have a trend with social events... it was sometime in January or February 2008, I don't remember the exact date, but I remember the night well. A friend and I were figuring out our plans for the evening, driving on our way to a friend's party when I texted a guy friend of mine to see what he was up to. Let's call him... Toby? I'm just gonna change all the names in the story to make it easier. (See, talk too much) Anyways, Toby* replies and says that Luke* is having a party, and asks if I'm coming. Immediately, my irrational mind jumps to the thought that Luke (who I had a small fling with about a month prior) intentionally didn't invite me to his little soiree and that he hates me and thinks I'm a joke and all of his friends do too and Toby was just innocently telling me and probably didn't realize I was intentionally not invited. This little, immediate, paranoid delusion triggered a panic attack so awful that I had to pull the car over off of the freeway and wait for fifteen minutes before I could stop shaking. I'm not sure how this all sounds when you're reading it, but I get chills just thinking about it. It was horrible and one of the first times I ever had an uncontrollable panic attack in front of someone else. I guess that's just an example of a social trigger. It's one that means a lot to me because that was when I had this revelation that my panic disorder was getting pretty serious and had taken on more structure - if that makes sense. It probably doesn't.

What happens during a panic attack? Well, I'm gonna guess they're a little different for each individual, since everybody is different. For me, I become overwhelmed (a truly perfect word to describe it) with the most horrible feeling imaginable - fear. But it's not fear like "oh, I'm afraid of the dark" or "I'm afraid of spiders" or "I'm afraid of so-and-so breaking up with me". It's like the most intense fear that every horror you could possibly imagine is going to come true and you are terrified and angry and sad and confused all at the same time - multiplied by one thousand. When I get an attack, it's really hard to breathe or breathe normally. Sometimes I hyperventilate to the point that I almost pass out. And during the nasty ones - I shake. Sometimes uncontrollably. The shaking is incredibly restless and it's almost like an adrenaline rush - in fact, it's exactly like an adrenaline rush. The only problem is, I don't feel powerful or strong or anything - I feel the exact opposite, but now I have this overload of adrenaline that is making me shake uncontrollably. Mostly it's my hands that shake, sometimes my legs and feet. Basically, it sucks. A lot.

I get panic attacks weekly, sometimes daily? Usually they're just little ones that last about a minute or two. Every now and then,, I'll get the nasty ones. The social ones. The ones that last from minutes to hours. Writing this helps more than you could realize. During the really nasty ones, I can't even write. I can't do anything. I've been dealing with this for so long that I think I'm pretty damn good at controlling it - especially in public. The feeling still sucks.

So yeah, I have panic disorder. I get panic attacks. They aren't always socially triggered, but most of the bad ones are. There is treatment like therapy and medication and right now I'm not in treatment. My last psychiatrist wanted to put me back on Zoloft, but I don't want to be on meds all the time. Only when I need them. Xanax would be ideal. Just for the big ones. The last shrink didn't think that was a good idea but screw him, I think I know me better than anyone, and I think the xanny thing is something I should try.

Yeah, I guess that's all I have to say about that...

Any questions? Hit me up.

P.S. After I published this post, I'm extremely flattered to announce that I apparently inspired a friend of mine to write about her experiences with panic disorder.

You can check out her blog here: http://sheilamikailli.tumblr.com

:-)