I'm totally back doing Flashback again and I'm having a really good time. It does make me wonder about how I should be defining my success or happiness in life. I'm totally a materialistic person. I am very much into buying expensive things, clothing, cars (unfortunately), food, and just stuff in general.

If I'm going to have something I want to have the best of that something. I suppose this is some incarnation of my need to be the best. Like if I'm driving on the freeway I don't like to be passed by another car if I can help it. I also always have to be right. Its really quite a bad personality trait. But its not like I have to be the best, its just that I have to classify everybody and everything as better or worse than something else. What is that? I have to compare everything to something else and decide which is better. This isn't so bad when I say something like Friday Night Lights is a better television show than Grey's Anatomy. But it gets me in trouble when in my mind I'm saying to myself "Girl A is prettier than Girl B" or "Girl A is too good for Boy A." And this manifests itself in weird ways too. Although I try to hide my thoughts from the world I'm pretty sure people can see it in my facial expressions or my tone of voice, despite my attempts to mask my unsavory thoughts.

So what does this have to do with my happiness and fulfillment in life? Well like many in our modern society, we've come to define our success in material ways. Like in Fight Club, and I'm only generally pulling from this, Ed Norton's character remarks about his now destroyed apartment that his IKEA-esque furniture portion of his life had been fulfilled and it was something he didn't have to worry about any more. Is that what its come to? I need a material good to define my success as a person? Do I need that pair of Diesel jeans? Yeah, I feel like I look better wearing them, but isn't that only because I think other people think I look better, like "oooh, Diesel jeans." But if I'm not defining my success and happiness through material means, by what means should someone define their life? I suppose my mom would say something about how I treated the world around me, in particular my friends, family and those I care about.

Are we merely just existing and are material possessions just another way for me to rank myself amongst my peers? Undoubtedly yes. But how do I break away from this? How do you define happiness when I've been bombarded by all of these media messages since my youth? Is it just about being happy in the moment you're in? But how do I know that I really am happy and I'm not just being influenced by what society has dictated should make me happy? It seems very paradoxical. Well I do know that I want to just shake about and bounce around my room when I hear this song from The Wombats and it makes me happy at least for now, and for now, that'll have to do... at least until I find a new pair of jeans.

The Wombats - Let's Dance to Joy Division

What the hell. I already messed up my new car. What a shitty careless driver I am. Breaking my passenger side rear view mirror casing. On the garage entrance no less. I hate having nice things. Dammit!

Christmas time. Its a time for family and for showing the ones you care about that you care about them by giving them things. I'm very confused. Nobody in my family goes to church, no one is particularly religious, except for my aunt and my mom, who are what can best be generalized as Buddhist. So why do we exchange gifts every year amongst the family members? When I was a kid I can't recall think about this because I only cared about getting gifts and playing with my cousins. But now that I'm grown and the adults no longer shower the "children," who are mostly college graduates now, with gifts. This year all the parents, mine and my aunts/uncles all decided the "kids" don't need gifts or money from them any more and we bought each other gifts instead. This made me realize the holiday, for my extended family, is an odd thing. Its like we celebrate it because we live in America and the holiday here is such a part of the culture. My cousins and myself are all the first generation of kids born here in the United States and perhaps celebrating this holiday was a way for the family to help us meld into our dual lives that we live.

I can remember my mom used to buy tickets for the family to goto this church performance of the story of Christmas at Crystal Cathedral. It was a really nice one with flying angels and everything, and perhaps she just enjoyed the production values, but mixing that with the non-denominational nature of my family seems odd. But I've even been to a Christian summer camp as well as Buddhist ones (the Christian ones were more fun, archery is infinitely more exciting than chanting). I suppose this lends to explain why I do have exposure to many different cultures and people and why I feel I'm generally accepting of everyone but I also think that it has played a part in my lack of a social identity. America is indeed a melting pot, but I don't know how well I've mixed in. Like in the recipe of America's melting pot, I'm one of those ingredients that fits in and enhances the soup but really doesn't belong? No, that was a horrible analogy. I got a better one, I'm like the crust that forms on the top of the soup, I fit in but I'm still sort of on the outside of the soup. Enjoyable, but not a necessity. Wow, that was an amazing analogy, I win!

I think Christmas, although it is the celebration of the life and birth of Christ, it has definitely evolved into something else in this day and age. Obviously the commercialism of the gift giving is a something entire books have been written for, the fact that it represents a happy time for children and time for family to get together still means something nice. Even if they just called it winter break, like they do at elementary schools for politically correct purposes, I still think it means the same thing. You can hate commercialism, but you can't hate that it allows time for family to be together and gives children time off school and adults time off work for a good reason, to be with family. Even if the Christmas name is misleading and the gift giving often leads to lighter wallets.

Happy Non-Denominational Christmas! Yay for rambling posts!

Bloc Party - Flux

I bought a new car today, one that turned out pricier than I was looking for. I guess it has been a learning experience. I was trying to avoid buying a car because all of the money I had saved up I had been saving for something grand and exciting and now that I have very little savings I feel exactly how I thought I would, tied down. Having monthly payments and having to work to make them, being in debt for the next 4 or 5 years gives me a mid-life crisis feeling. Signing the paperwork for my car didn't make me happy particularly. Don't get me wrong, I like my car and prior to signing the paperwork I definitely felt like it was the car that I liked the most of the cars I looked it, but afterwards, coming home, and looking at my savings and realizing I'll be owing $300 $350 whatever a month until I'm 28-29 years old makes me sad. It is definitely true that I don't like commitment but I also very much feel trapped by the debt. I feel like I've sacrificed a bit of my future today. Buyer's remorse? Maybe.

Radiohead - Reckoner

I'm getting ready to goto work and looking at Harrison Ford on the box cover of my Indiana Jones DVD set. What a cool guy. Which job am I getting ready for? I'm getting ready to go operate a ride at Disneyland. Its a job generally reserved for college kids and retired people, which I am neither. Is it normal to always feel like you're in a state of transition? Isn't there some point where you're supposed to feel like this is where you belong in that moment? Maybe its just me, but it feels like there are constantly decisions and choices to be made at every turn. Like recently I have to decide if I want to buy a car, used or new, cheap or expensive. Do I want to have monthly payments? Do I just want to buy a used car with the cash I have? If I have monthly payments, it means I'm stuck with them and it generally means I'm stuck financially. Then I have two jobs. I can't and don't want to quit my entry level job, but I don't want to commit at the well paying "adult" job because I don't enjoy anything about it (outside of the pay and wearing ties). Its like I always have one foot in and one foot out.

Kanye West - Everything I Am