It’s been a long three weeks since my last session with my shrink and this morning our discussion came back to my father again. I asked her what my issue was and she said that I had this problem of doing things that is good for me, but feel guilty because it isn’t what is best for family and I’m just irrationally imposing the guilt and pressure on myself.

Eventually and of course, it all boils down to my father and how I feel guilty about being responsible or believing that I am responsible for his death, as irrational as that is, I feel that way. I sometimes still believe that I am the reason that he died. I am the reason that he picked up that second job and eventually worked himself to death.

I’m the bad guy of the story. I’m the reason why my dad died and therefore, I shouldn’t ever be happy. That’s my penance, which is my sentence. I should never be happy because of it.

It’s irrational.

That’s how I felt and that’s what I believed for so long that it became a truth. It became something that I lived with, ingrained in the fragile psyche of mine to make sense of things. I’m the bad guy. I caused this and I have to live with the consequences. I’ll never be happy again.

That’s why I can never be happy. That’s why I can never believe that my father, that my parents are proud of me. That’s why I can never be truly happy even though I am living my life on my own terms and actually genuinely enjoy living a life alone.

If I take my family out of the equation and just look at my life and how I am living it, I am truly happy. I love being on my own with nothing but my thoughts, books, entertainment, and my adoring pets to keep me company. I love that I go out and socialize on my own terms. If friends want to go out and do something that I don’t want to do, I don’t go. I do things on my own terms.

I love the fact that I am independent and am able to just pick up and go on a road trip by myself or just venture off and do things on my own without anyone. I love that. That makes me happy. I’m happy that I’m able to travel and that I do travel.

I should be happy. I am, if we take away my family and the pressures of finding someone, settling down, and having children. But, I hold onto it.

I am able to dismiss other people’s inquiries and not care about what other people think on that issue or any issue of how I live my life, but when it comes to family and their expectations, I have a problem.

Growing up, I guess I was always the filial son, wanting to do what my parents wanted, to make them happy. My biggest fear was disappointing my family, especially my dad and there are times when I do feel that I have disappointed them because I’m 35, not married and no children. I disappoint them because I don’t want any of that right now. I can’t see myself having any of that.

My shrink says if I continue on this way of irrational thinking, I’ll never be truly fully happy because if I chose this solitary life, the life that I love right now, I’ll always feel that guilt.

I have to see the other side. I have to throw away the guilt. I have to just be rational.

I have to rewrite the truth that I have created and just see the plain rational truth of everything.

I did not kill my father. I did not disappoint him. I made my dad proud. He would be definitely proud of the man that I have become today. He would have loved and be proud of who I became.

He’d love me. I’m a man who, deep down, is a genuinely good guy. I’m independent and respectful of my elders and my family. I love my family. I have a good job. He would love me.

My father would definitely be proud of me.

I need to see that. I need to believe that. I have no reason to believe that he wouldn’t be except for my irrational need to put this guilt on myself because I believed I was to blame for his passing.

So, let’s make a pact with myself, that I should just see the rational truth in all things, especially when it relates to my father passing away.

I did not kill my father. There’s no reasonable explanation as to why he passed away so young. There’s nothing that will make me understand why. I just have to live with the fact that shit happens in life.

My dad passed away from a heart attack because heart disease runs in my family. He didn’t take care of himself, in terms of exercising, watching his diet, and resting.

He worked two full time jobs, because he was bored. I have to believe that.

That is the truth. That is the new truth as to why things happened.

I was just down here, finding myself, doing what was best for me because I needed fixing. I didn’t do it. I didn’t kill my dad.

I shouldn’t feel this guilt. The only thing that I should feel is just pure loss.

The only thing that I was responsible for was not truly believing that he was proud of me.

I should believe what his boss said, that he was very proud of me, moving down to LA on my own and doing my own thing. He was proud of me.

I have to believe that. He was proud of me and should be proud of me.

There’s no fingers to point, no one to blame. He had a heart attack. That’s life. Shit happens. My motto.

Be rational. Just be rational and think this through. I am smart enough to see that. Take away the blame. Stop punishing myself.

Just stop.

I deserve better. I deserve to live my life guilt free. I deserve to be happy and this guilt that I am imposing on myself blocks that happiness.

So, stop it. Just stop it.

It is time. I have suffered enough.

It is time to just let it go and take away the biased blinders and see things how they were.

Dad got a heart attack and died. That was it. It’s just that simple. I had nothing to do with his death. I didn’t do anything. I didn’t cause it. Stop blaming and stop pointing fingers. There’s no one at fault.

There’s no bad guy.

Shit happens. C’est la vie. That’s life.

Let it go.

It is time.

There’s no forgiving because I didn’t do anything wrong. Stop blaming myself.

I knew him and knowing that I miss him is enough. There’s no need to punish myself or make up these stories as to why it had to happen. It just happened.

Let it go. It’s not my fault. There’s no one to blame.

Let it go.

Just stop.

Stop.

Let it go.

It is time to heal. It is time to be okay. It is time to allow myself to be happy.

It is just fucking time for this. I have punished myself long enough.

Enjoy life.

That’s what Dad would have wanted. That’s what Dad wants.

I keep saying that I am a lot like him in so many ways and I think that if I was in Dad’s shoes, I would want the same, for me to be happy and to live in the way that makes you happy.

No pressure. No guilt.

Dad was proud. You know he was. You can hear it in his voice. Believe in that. You hear it from what others says.

Believe in that. You have no reason to doubt them.

They are genuine sentiments.

It is time. Stop punishing yourself, Phong. Just stop.

It’s time to live your life guilt free and allow yourself to be happy.

You are the one in control. I am in control.

It is only you who can allow yourself to be happy.

I allow myself to be happy. I set myself free.

You just have to put aside all of these bullshit irrational baseless pessimistic and self-deprecating sentiments and ideas and just take things as what they are.

Life happened. Dad’s heart gave up because he didn’t take care of himself. He was proud of you when he passed away and you know it, you hear it, you see it. He was proud. He’s proud of you now. He just wants you to be happy, no matter what.

Just allow yourself to be.

Rewrite your truth, to just the truth.

Stop blaming yourself. Be rational.

Let it go.

Just let it go.

You know it is the right thing to do. You know it is, so just do it.

Just stop doing this to yourself and just allow yourself to live and be happy.

It’ll be hard. I’ll be difficult to give up those guilty feelings and that self-imposed heavy burden, but it is the right thing to do.

It’ll take some adjustment, but it’ll be right.

It’ll be right.

I did not kill my father.

You won’t even need to learn to forgive yourself because there is nothing to forgive. You didn’t do it. I didn’t do it. I did no wrong.

I didn’t do anything wrong.

I am just an innocent that got in the crossfire of life. Shit happened.

Just grieve and move on.

I’ll be all right. I’ll be happier.

You know you see it. You know this is right. You just have to allow yourself to believe it.

The choice is yours. The choice is mine.

It is time. It is definitely time to stop punishing yourself for something you didn’t do.

Just stop it.

So, remember today. Today you start healing.

Today you start living a guilt free life.

Today you allow yourself to be happy.

Today, I chose to be happy.

Today.

Writer’s block. It’s happening again.

Or did it ever go away? When was the last time that I got inspired and wrote non-stop with anything creative? I don’t know. It’s been a long time since those first 25 pages in my script.

Now, there’s just only a little bit added to it, and that is about it. I stare at the page, the blinking cursor and I see the scene in my head, how everything transpire, but I stop. I can’t write. I can’t put those images to words.

Something holds me back and I really can’t put my mind on it. Something is stopping me from the free flowing-ness of creating something, typing something, putting words on screen like I can do with these little diatribes so easily.

Blocked.

Procrastinating.

Fear.

I’m too in my head, trying to figure everything out and I need to stop that. Stop all logic and just write.

Write dammit. Write.

I need to get something out. I need to write it out. I need to do.

Don’t waste words or time typing out something that means nothing, or do. If it is shit, your group will let you know that it is shit and you change it ’cause deep inside you know it is shit also.

Just write dammit. You fucker, just write.

Write.

* * *

Mind and brain things.

We have scaled back my therapy to every other week. I guess I made progress and I honestly do feel that I have made progress.

I don’t feel the same stuckness that I felt when I first started.

For the most part, I do feel like myself, being always fatigued aside.

I think I just need to be more active and I’m not, especially when I’m working, sitting on my ass all day. I need to be more active, get more energy.

I never felt tired during the Utah trip. I was bustling with energy, even after a long day’s hike. I slept horribly in the hotel room, get up and do it all over again and I feel fine.

Pressure and rut. Falling into the trap that because I’m a certain age I have to be somewhere in my life.

Not true. I’m 35, single, and I enjoy being single. I enjoy independent life and living on my own and through this self-searching journey of therapy, I realized that I am not ready to give that up yet. I am not ready to be in any kind of relationship yet and I shouldn’t force myself to be in one because I feel pressured that I should be at a certain phase in my life because I’m of a certain age and that everyone around me is already there.

I need to stop that.

Enjoy this freedom and explore like you do.

Live my life, on my own terms.

That had always been me. I do what my gut says and I do what I want. I always have.

Sure I have these nagging voices in my head and my personal demons that tell me to do other things, I just have to ignore them. Push them out of my head.

I just need to live on my own terms.

The happiest moments in my life is just me living. They are moments of when I wanted to do something, go somewhere, and just doing it. No questions asked, no waiting on someone, but just doing.

I wanted to do Utah. I went. I decided on a whim to do Tokyo, within a day, it was mostly planned. I wanted to do SE Asian, I made it happen. Niagara Falls, done.

Making plans and doing it. Just living.

It just feels good to just do what I set out to do in terms of my life, because they were my choices and no one telling me what to do.

Live.

Live with the freedom that I have and that I just value so much.

I’m sure much of this need for independence does stem from losing my father and that the last thing that I was able to give him was me being independent and taking care of myself.

My parents always raised me that way. Don’t rely on anyone to help you. Do everything on your own. Work hard for your things.

Nothing was ever handed to me. I worked and paid my dues and it was a long long process to get to where I am in my life right now. It was a very long time and as I told my shrink, why rush it.

Don’t rush it. Enjoy it. Enjoy my time doing whatever it is that I want to do.

Chicago in winter is booked. Next up, Iceland. Northern Lights. My first international trip on my own. Bucket list.

Done. Checked.

Just do. Think of what you want to do and just do.

* * *

I’m not a fan of dating. Just not for me, especially online dating. Just never worked for me and I guess me being in the place where I am now, I never put in the full effort ’cause I am just not ready for it.

I’m sure there will be a time when I will be ready for it and maybe I’ll put in a better effort, but right now, I’m just going to put off any ideas that I need to be with someone, to start a family, to have kids, any thoughts like that and just push them away. Kill them. Kill those ideas. They are just detrimental to any kind of happiness in my life.

* * *

Besides my constant need of independence and the deep deep fear of losing it because of a relationship, I didn’t realize how much of a control freak I am.

I want control.

I like control.

Maybe it is because things will go my way or maybe it is the whole being taught to do everything on my own thing.

I have no clue, but whenever I’m with people that are doing things that can be done better, not to my liking, I get annoyed.

Control.

Never really thought that I would be, but it does make sense. I guess it just take some therapy to finally get it through my head.

People walking too slow. People driving too slow. Annoying.

* * *

Be open to the possibility.

Just be open to the possibility of change, or someone in my life. If I do find someone that I like, who seems independent, and is willing to give me space, or someone who is a lot like me in terms of independence, be open to that person. Don’t cut them out.

But I just need to be totally aware of the person first and not be so oblivious as to when girls like me and such.

I’m horrible at that. Just horrible.

Just be open.

* * *

So, the plan of action. Live and be open to possibilities.

Open to meeting someone like Liz, the girl I met at Dead Horse Point, on her own personal road trip to explore the wilderness from via Toronto.

Again, once she told me that she was doing this on her own, she went from a cute average girl to hot damn you are so fucking hot and sexy right now, marry me type of girl.

Independent girls, they get me going.

I guess it makes sense. I value my independence, I love my independence. It’s one of the most important things in my life that I value so highly. I would be attracted to someone who feels the same or is the same.

Independence.

Live and be open.

LIVE AND BE OPEN.

* * *

Food.

I love to eat and I constantly think of food.

Not just food that I can go out and eat, but foods that I can cook.

I think I’ve been just cooking a lot lately. It’s something to help me relax, to fill the time, and something to just nourish me.

I guess I just need another creative outlet in my life since my photography and my writing had taken a backseat to what it was before.

Those are things that I definitely need to get back into, especially photography. I just need to do it. No excuses. Just do it.

But I think food is a good replacement. A good skill to just know and perfect.

Plus, I need to save money and stop eating out.

And I need to eat healthier. This way, at least I know what is going into my body and I have some semblance of control over it. I’m still not as diligent as I should be in terms of not eating out, but it works right now.

* * *

Blah, I need new clothes.

Winter clothes and regular clothes.

But at the moment, the pressing thing is some winter clothes for Chicago. Something warm so I can just bundle up and then maybe some outdoor winter clothes for Iceland. Clothes. Money. Blah.

I guess my new suit can wait until next year, closer to Dat’s wedding.

I’ll figure it out.

* * *

The life.

I am living it.

I am living a life that I love, doing whatever it is that I want.

I get to travel and explore.

I guess my shrink is right in that sense, that I am doing what many people would be envious of, to just work, save money and just travel and see the world.

Those are big accomplishments. Those are things that many dream of and strive for.

I am doing it and I shouldn’t take it for granted.

Be happy about it.

You are living the dream and living the life that you always wanted.

Enjoy it while you can.

Be in the moment and stop thinking about stupid shit that you have no control over.

Just live.