The Lessons of Heart Break

I don’t think there will ever be anything better or worse than heartbreak. It gives us such important pieces- it teaches us that our heart is broken, so therefore we must have been capable of love in the first place. If you’re feeling heartbroken, you’re feeling an emotion that’s way deeper than that- you’re feeling that love drain from your body and transform into a cocktail of other things. Maybe it’s regret, or sadness or loneliness. Maybe it’s the “what ifs” and “what could have beens”… maybe it’s wishing you took one more kiss or one more night to live your love to the fullest.

I think it’s the feeling after they’re gone- that silence suddenly seems different. The alerts on your phone that mean less and less as the days pass.
Maybe that empty feeling is all the memories leaving your body slowly- every hug. Every minute of intense eye contact. Every hour of phone conversations. Every mile driven to see each other. You just wake up one day, have THAT conversation- then it’s over. Everything changes in the blink of an eye.

When your heart is broken, the fault doesn’t matter. The mistakes don’t matter. No fight or argument or disagreement could ever seem significant at that moment, because I don’t think we’re ever the only ones hurting. Heart break has no boundaries or discriminations.
I don’t think it’s the “loss of love” that hurts the most, but actually realizing we were capable of love in the first place- and that is truly tragic and beautiful, and such an important lesson.

The Problem I Have With EXPERIENCE …

“Experience”…That word hits a nerve with me so greatly. 

All we are in this life is “experiences” right? I mean we are only renting these bodies- we don’t own anything. Honestly we’re just walking around EXPERIENCING things. Anything and everything. That’s all it is. It bothers me to no end when people take their lives so serious or they miss out on experiences just because of their “morals” or “beliefs”. Fuck. We all need to believe in something, right? I’m not criticizing religion or faith because that’s not my place. We are all complete strangers- who the fuck am I to tell you about life? But I ask you- Why do so many people walk this line and scare themselves into what it’s all SUPPOSED to look like or who they think they’re SUPPOSED to be? There are no fucking bunk beds in caskets. I think more people need to live for themselves rather than those around them. We need to take more chances and fucking ruin a couple of fancy events. I don’t know. Who cares. We’re humans. And humans are messy and complex and no one will ever really know what’s going on in someone else’s head. We all crave normalcy but we’ll never fucking obtain the true meaning of “normal. 

“Normal” doesn’t fucking exist. 
So who cares if you have exposed some “unethical” behaviors. We all have them, but few posses the honesty (or desire of honesty) to hold themselves accountable. So tell your “friends”, associates, colleagues WHOEVER- to fuck off if they’re so bothered by your “unethical” experiences. I understand the anxiety of it all, because that’s what this society has groomed us to be- scared of everyone’s irrelevant opinions. 

A good friend of mine recently told me the importance of the word “process”. Everyone has opinions and lots of people are willing to share those opinions with you, usually when it’s inconvenient for you. Everyone thinks their opinions are more relevant than yours so get used to that. 

The PROCESS of it though- we can’t control others actions. We can only control our own reaction to it. So go through that PROCESS. The process of accepting people and their opinions (even if they are complete SHIT) and just hold true to yourself and how you react. Your reaction is the only thing that is certain and true, so keep that up and take every single day as a learning EXPERIENCE. 

Have you ever been called “selfish”?

There are very few things in this life that I regret. I’ve done a lot; seen a lot; and been through more than one person should be able to handle. But one thing I will always regret is not putting myself first sooner. I have consistently been the “shoulder to cry on”, the “sober one to bring everyone home”, the “level-headed one that can understand both sides of the argument”. I’ve always been the person to be leaned on- and hardly ever the one doing the leaning. I’ve discovered lately that finding the people like me to lean on has gotten increasingly difficult and rare. I think we all deserve a little bit of time to be selfish and focus on ourselves. I’d never say that it is a bad thing- but part of being human is feeling things- happiness, sadness, and sometimes pain too. There are only so many times one person can be shot down before they give up completely. There is no way that we can learn to love others correctly if we don’t know how to love ourselves correctly, and I honestly think that its bullshit that we’re all so scared of being called selfish. How can we adequately relate to other humans if we are all hiding our own emotions and feelings of wanting to be appreciated? Why is it so frowned upon to do things that benefit ourselves? I get strange stares every time I walk into a restaurant alone. People look at me with sorry eyes like I didn’t choose to be there. This generation is so focused on opinions of others and how many likes they can get in a fake virtual reality that they pass by the human emotions inside of them. It’s really time that we all start acting like we give a fuck about our own well being and stop caring who’s watching. 

So if you don’t hear from me and you think I’m a “bitch” or I’m not focused enough on YOUR expectations- well then please keep on waiting to hear from me. 

When you can’t be everyone’s savior anymore…

Do you ever get to that point where all you want to do is break the fuck down? When you physically and mentally can no longer handle being the one that everyone relies on and turns to. Your mind gets clouded with negativity even thought you’re struggling to prevent that. One person can only handle so much before they completely lose themselves in what it’s all supposed to look like. There is nothing more hurtful than counting the billions of times you’ve heard people say “I’m here if you need me”, and then looking around and still being alone. We all can only be the people that we are- we can’t change or morph into someone else. The truth is inevitable and we all let our real colors bleed through when reality hits, wether we want it to or not… would you be proud of those colors, from an outsiders point of view?

An Open Letter to Fathers…

An open letter to fathers:
Being a father consists of so many more things than just simply producing a child. I honestly don’t care how you got to be one; be it an accident, on purpose, unknowingly, or even just one drunken night. All of that is irrelevant to me. 

I’M YOUR DAUGHTER. 

I’m hoping to stand up for daughters everywhere with a less than perfect relationship with their fathers. I get it. We all make mistakes. We all have things happen to us that weren’t expected or weren’t part of that big plan you had as a teenager. I think by our adult lives, we can expect to make a million mistakes, and that’s ok. The real test though is how you handle or correct these mistakes. You deserve a night out here and there. You deserve to go to dinner and hang out with friends. But let’s get real: when you are a parent, a lot of these things get pushed to the side because your child is your priority. You know, that living, breathing PERSON you created??? Again, I don’t care how it happened. An accident? Ok. Guess what? This is your life now. You’re going to carry on your old ways and pretend you don’t have to be a parent because it “was an accident”? I have no sympathy. I didn’t ask to be here. As children, we don’t pre-exist in some parallel universe and subconsciously ask your permission to be born. YOU, as parents, brought us here. And there we are, poor helpless babies, relying on YOU to turn us into decent human beings. Here’s the kicker though: usually, if you suck at being a parent, chances are, your kid might suck too. It’s so unfortunate because we have the capacity to be these amazing, caring and loving individuals, and some of us may not get that option. If we come from a place of anger, disrespect and controversy, what do you expect us to be like??? 

     To all the parents who separate and then marry someone else: Please be sure that you’re not bringing Satan into your child’s life. If you can’t open your eyes and see YOUR spouse, the new person YOU chose, being abusive to YOUR child… You don’t deserve to have that respect from that child. If they tell you that your spouse is abusive, mean and manipulative, you better get your shit together and listen because what kind of person would that make you, turning a blind eye?? Despite what you might think, your kids need you in more ways than one. They need to feel like you care about them. They need to feel like you are loving and protecting them. I don’t care how old your kids get, they still need a father. I’m almost 30 years old and there are days when all I want is my dad to return a text message. 

     Sometimes we get so removed from this world by what we consider “normalcy” that we don’t even know what it’s supposed to be like. I watched my best friend have a phone conversation with her dad yesterday and it actually hurt me to listen to it. She had him on speaker and he sounded so happy to be talking to her. He didn’t ignore the call or sound irritated by her and the crazy gardening questions she was asking him. He was laughing and playing along. And at the end of the call, he made sure to say “I love you” first. I think every parent needs to understand that your kids are capable of amazing things. We are adults now, but that doesn’t mean we don’t need you. We were taught to be respectful, but we were also taught that respect should be reciprocated. If I were you, I’d make sure I was doing my part, and I’d make sure that I can go back on my past decisions and be confident that they were the right ones. If you can’t do that as a parent, and know you gave it 150%, then I think maybe it’s time to reevaluate your life before it’s beyond repair. 

The ones that mean the most…

I guess I can’t tell you why I am this way. My walls are built higher than any fucking prison I’ve ever seen. I’m guarded; reserved when I need to be. We all have that piece of us that is always evident and we drag it around with us for a good portion of our lives, if not the whole thing. That inner feeling or sense that eats us up inside every second of the day.

 Mine is trust. I’ve learned that we are born alone and we will die alone. There ain’t no bunkbeds in caskets. This life is ours; our days are borrowed and our bodies are rented. The people you “trust” usually end up gone, and at the end of the day, they turn into who they said they’d never be. The ones that have said “I love you” never meant it. They never stayed around long enough to prove or show love. It’s an unattainable emotion. It’s something everyone knows but very few people experience for real. 

     She told me she loved me but she was really out to get me. She’s the fucking devil and she’s not happy unless everyone around her is suffering. Sociopathic, schizophrenic psycho. Never in my life have I met anyone like her; with those devil eyes and bad intentions. 

But they teach you something, these horrible people. They show you exactly who you should never be, and for that we need to be grateful. 

I’ve decided that 98% of people you meet will disappoint you…

Before you send me hate emails for that statement, just hear me out.

We all play this game every single day. It’s not one that has rules or winners and losers. We play this game where we interact with people; maybe a few, maybe a whole lot; we talk about the weather and we talk about sports teams and presidential candidates. We laugh and joke and look people in their eyes and hear their stories. We subconsciously make assumptions of their lives based on the pieces of themselves in which they’ve shared with us. We say ok I like this person or maybe we don’t.  We have these thoughts in our brains and feelings in our bodies and we just carry on until something happens. Like you don’t see that person ever again, or you move to a different place in you’re life and they just aren’t a piece of it. It happens all the time.

But here’s what I don’t get. I don’t get when people share so much of themselves with you; you feel something for them, and assume its reciprocated, and then all of a sudden they’re gone or acting out of character, for seemingly no reason at all. I don’t get that. This goes back to my last post about being honest with ourselves and correlating our inner feelings with our outer gestures and words. This fucking game though… We are stuck still playing this fucking game with each other ; with ourselves; and it’s really self destructive. I wish we could all say what we mean and follow through with our promises. Because somehow we all turn into who we said we’d never be…and you never know who you will be disappointing.

The Pursuit of Happiness

You know what bothers me a whole lot? Dishonesty with ourselves. Somewhere along the lines, someone made up these ridiculous rules about life, like how long to wait to call after you get a girls number, or how long you have to hang out with someone before you admit to liking them. 

We do this nonsensical charade of pretending not to feel things or feelings. We discredit our own instinctual emotions because we’re worried about ‘breaking’ some unwritten rule. I think the world needs more honesty. It needs more people who aren’t afraid to say what they want, feel the emotions that are true, and show someone their emotions however they believe feels right at that moment. 

You know, I believe this world would be better if we all got honest with ourselves and went after whatever it was that made us the happiest. Sometimes we fall into a hole where nothing seems to go right and we get depressed and give up on things and people. I truly agree because I’ve been there more than once, but even pretending to be happy can change your mood. We have to think about the small things that can help us. Seeing a text from someone you love talking to. Hearing that one persons voice that makes everything worth it. 

So I guess my proposition is to be honest with yourself today. We need to learn to hold on to the ones that make us feel something. We get so caught up in the mediocrity and redundancy of life that we sometimes miss out on these people. And it’s such a shame. 

I guess I’m too predictable…

I feel like sometimes the world gets the best of me… and I know I’m better than that, but its difficult to comprehend why things happen to you even after you do nothing but good. I actually had to say to myself today; “Why the fuck are people so bad? Why do people do things intentionally to hurt others?”
Ok… I’m lying a little… I said it out loud. To the woman at the bank who was helping me.
“Why the fuck are people such assholes?”
I think that’s how it went. She looked up at me, laughed and said “The golden question”
And she’s right. There really is no fucking answer as to why people are like this. How could they be so cruel and so evil that they are just out to hurt someone? I keep trying to live on this notion that everyone I come across is going to have the same heart as me, and I always end up telling myself how unrealistic that thought is… it’s so fucking sad. I have gone out of my way for people on more than one occasion and it’s really shocking when the people you are closest to don’t reciprocate when you are in your time of need. It’s sickening actually; that’s a better word… and that’s all I’ve known for two weeks now, is that gut wrenching, throw-up, dizzy and breathless kind of feeling.. that feeling you get when you’re alone and have Noone to guide you. It’s unbearable sometimes.
It takes all I have in me to keep going.. to keep looking up and getting to the next day. It takes all my strength not to break down and cry… but I know I’m not weak. And I know that strength comes from within. I have to keep trying to believe in somewhere better than here.

Things that pawn shop workers won’t tell you…

Okay, my co-worker and I are DYING laughing at all the things we can come up with that we hate hearing while running the pawn shop. I must tell you, we are both super dedicated and we LOVE what we do, but if we don’t make fun of ourselves a little bit, we might not make it.

We have collectively compiled this list of things that we absolutely DREAD hearing. Don’t say these things to us. Just don’t. Ever. Thank you for helping save our sanity.

1. “How much are (group of like items that are all clearly individually priced)?”      OKAY. Please. For the LOVE of whatever God you believe in; before you ask me this question, look for a damn price tag. I promise you that I put a lot of time and effort into finding the best price for this item, and I PROMISE you that I put the sticker on it. Prices are negotiable, but please fucking at least try to look with your eyes first.
2. “I have a trunk full of (worthless item)…”     DO NOT. Fucking. Tell me. That you have a ‘trunk full’ of anything. I promise I do not have enough time in this day to dig through your trunk. And if I do take the time and effort to come outside to your 1994 Buick and attempt to look through your trunk and I find ZERO items worth anything to me, I will hate you every time you come in again. That is a guarantee.
3. “I have this bag of jewelry; My grandmother gave it to me and I just know it’s worth at least a million dollars… she told me it’s from (far away royal place)…”        UGH. Really though? Really? Have you ever heard of the gold market? Did you know that the gold market fluctuates EVERY. SINGLE. DAY? Something that was worth $1,000 yesterday could very easily be worth $700 today. Or, something that was $300 last year could be worth $2,000 today. Really. The gold market is unpredictable and the price of the day is public knowledge. Do some fucking research before you come in here and tell me how to do my job. THANKS 🙂
4. “…I understand, but I bought this at (Large Chain Jewelry Store In Every Mall) and I paid $3,000 for it, so I’d like to get at LEAST $2,900”                    *My eyes bug out of my head IMMEDIATELY* I am regretting the day you were born. I am wishing spontaneous fucking combustion on your entire being right now. Hello. I am the year 2015. Nice to meet you. This over here is a computer. It has Google on it, if you look hard. Why don’t you sit down, do a quick little search called “jewelry store markup”. Read it. Read it all for the rest of your days. Please. Fucking educate yourselves before you come to me and yell at me when you hear the price that I would like to offer you for your wedding set after your messy divorce. Look, I’m sorry you’re pissed off, but big chain jewelry stores are not selling things for what they’re worth. They’re selling a finance plan so you can pay 29.9% interest on a ring that is worth one third of what you’ve spent. And you’ll still be paying for it after the divorce is finalized. Do yourself a favor and come to me first to buy your jewelry. You’re welcome.
5. “I have this rare coin. It’s from (country that doesn’t exist anymore). I know nothing about it. It’s not gold or silver and i would like (absurd amount of money)”  PLEASE. JUST GO HOME. Please. I can’t even.
6. “How much will you loan me for a guitar that looks kind of like the one you have here, but different?” (Me: ‘Can you give me the brand and model number of yours?’) “Ummm I don’t think it has one” (Me: ‘I’m sure it does…’)            MY GOD, PLEASE. Please just stop being lazy and look for something that I can look up. Why is this so difficult? You want me to take MY time to look this up and find you a precise amount, but you don’t want to take the time to tell me what the FUCK you have? Enough.
7. “I have this thing… I don’t know what it is…”     Then I promise you. I don’t know what it is either.
8. “…but wait, I think I have a picture of me and it’s in the background…”                      STAHHHP. I still don’t know what it is. I don’t care. Stopped caring at your last question. Bye now.
9. “Why won’t you take (item from 20 years ago that’s broken, falling apart or not usable whatsoever)?”                      UMMMMM. Why the fuck do you think?
10. “Will you take this phone with a cracked screen?”                     Do you like shards of glass in your fingers? Oh, you don’t? That’s weird. Neither do my customers. Throw it in the middle of the street please. I’ll wait.
11. When I answer the phone- “Hello, XYZ Pawn Shop”   Customer- “Uh hi is this XYZ Pawn Shop???”   Bitch, I said ONE FUCKING THING to you. The ONLY thing I just said to you, is the answer to the question you are asking. Pay the fuck attention. Or stop calling. Better yet, don’t call anyone ever again. For as long as you live.
12. “Why can’t I have this (expensive brand tool for sale) for $1?”        BITCH. Because it is EXPENSIVE and I have too much money into it. If I pay $20 for a wrench, and I mark it $35, I promise you. You are not paying $5 for it. You’re just not. Byeeeeee.
13. “How come you won’t take my (stupid item nobody wants)? You have one right here…”      Hey! Ya wanna know why we have one? Because. NOBODY. FUCKING. WANTS. IT.
14. “Aren’t you scared, being a woman in a pawn shop?”                  Nope. I’m not. Aren’t you scared because I have weapons and alarms and things to hurt you with if you fuck with me? Have a great day.
15. “Can’t you please give me five more dollars?”     Um. No.     “BUT WHYYYYY?”     Please fucking don’t. I didn’t want to give you what I already gave you, so leave before I take it back.  “WHYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYYY?”           Don’t beg. It’s not cute. And don’t call me names. I’m the one trying to help you. Please be nice.
16. “Well, you don’t have it, so do you think ABC Pawn Shop down the road has it?”      ARE YOU JOKING? What do you think we all have ESP with each other? You think we get home every night and just get on a big group phone call together like “Ok, read me all your inventory lists so that I can tell these jackasses tomorrow what you guys have…” We don’t. Really. I swear. We don’t do that. Google it. Thanksssss.
17. When we don’t take your items, please do not scrounge through your cup holders and glove compartments in an attempt to find something that we’ll accept. Like 99% of the time, whatever crumb-covered item you find in there is worth nothing. Go home please.
18. *I ask a customer for the model number on an item*   Customer- “Do you mean serial number?”    *HUGE EYE ROLL* “No. I am sure that I mean MODEL NUMBER”   Customer- “Is that the one that says ‘model’ then a bunch of numbers?”          I’m sorry… WHAT? Do you hear yourself speak?
19. LASTLY. And most importantly. PLEASE. Be respectful! We are tough because we have to be. We get taken advantage of sometimes too, and we genuinely want to help. If you treat us like real humans, we will reciprocate. And most likely, we will help you out! That’s why we’re here!!! 🙂