Human

In the Christian culture, there are certain catch phrases that are widely used and within six months, you begin to find yourself saying the same things. Whether it be "guard your heart" or "authentic community," they are implanted throughout sermons, praise songs, and quick, unemotional, serviceable answers to tough questions. They remind you of deep fried fast food that are trite, unoriginal, but just do the job. It leaves no room for patches of breath, no room for creativity, and when you start using phrases like "authentic community," it ironically strips bare the very essence of authenticity.

One of the words that keep rising up in these circles like a bad Ashlee Simpson song as something that you do not care for, but cannot ignore either. Vulnerability. The dictionary defines it as "being susceptible to physical or emotional injury." Why Christians like this word and its definition confuses me as well, but the puzzlement only begins there. The interesting thing about many Christians, let me stop myself. Someone told me I make too many generalizations. In our politically correct world, it's always more acceptable to mention yourself in the category. The interesting thing about a select number of Christians like myself is that we constantly will use vulnerability without ever actually being vulnerable. It is like that UGA Bulldog fan that prides himself on being diehard when he cannot name more than five players on the team. Conversations often run like this:
A: Peter Christ of Saint Elijah, what are you struggling with?
B: I just need to be more vulnerable. I have a lot of things going on.
A: Mmmm, yes I will pray for you.

The very question that A asks assumes the fact that you have "things going on," so will someone in this Christian world just say what is going on!?! Instead, we hide in our masks of preachers galore, attempting to call out our very own inability to say anything. <----That is exactly what a man or a woman wearing a mask of a preacher would say. You see how easily it is to be pushed around by these words till you walk out of the conversation or the sanctuary, realizing to yourself, "Wait a minute, he did everything to prove the point he was trying to argue against."

So allow me to cut the bullshit from the past three paragraphs that have essentially stalled this thing called vulnerability. And let me just be goddamn vulnerable.
1) Curses have always been my way and my family's way of expressing ourselves. And by you telling me I shouldn't do it has only made me to stop doing it around you who tell me that. I am not saying it is right. I am not saying it is wrong. I am just saying I'm confused as fuck.
2) There are times when I absolutely hate God. And there are times when I say "there are times" because it always assumes that is the past and removed from the present, when most of the time, it is the present. At this time, I absolutely hate God.
3) I have stopped hating God not because I now love God, but because I keep reading that God is good and perfect. And to define God as anything but that wouldn't make any sense. It's like declaring the NY Knicks = Good Team. It just doesn't make sense to say that God does not equal perfect. So in light of that, I have found it easier to simply say he doesn't exist or doesnt' care about me. Nonetheless, I must channel my anger, my frustrations, and my ridiculously dead and false hopes to something or someone. And that just makes hating myself so much easier.
4) I want a girl. I'm sick of freedom and I want a little romance.
5) I just want to quit this whole Christian thing sometimes, get drunk, get high, go to the strip club, grind on as many strange women in the club as possible, be vain as I waste my money on clothes and games, get into fights verbally and physically, and just say "fuck off." Wrestling with God is like hitting yourself in the face. Even when you win, you lose. In fact you lose much more if you win.
6) I am just going to say it. Because men don't. I do not struggle with lust. I do not struggle with the way I look at women. Not because I do not struggle with these two things, but because the phrasing of how we say these two things are so buttered down that it makes the word lust sound like I am struggling from abstaining from eating Krispy Kreme Doughnuts, rather than the raw and disgusting thing that it is. DISCLAIMER: WOMEN, DO NOT READ THIS IF YOU DO NOT WANT TO KNOW THE TRUTH ABOUT THE MEN THAT YOU SPEAK WITH ON A DAILY BASIS AND MEN YOU DO NOT SPEAK WITH ON A DAILY BASIS. We. No, I need to own it. I masturbate. I look at pornographic movies, magazines, stories, and even jokes. I fantasize. I do not care about your body or your life many minutes of my life. Hell yes, I feel guilty. Hell yes, I want to change. So why don't I? Punch your pillow out of frustration the same number of times I have done it since I was 12, and then we will talk. Think of a crack addict or an alcoholic without support groups (and the ones that do exist are unprofessional "blind leading the blind" conversations between peers) and everything within ourselves that says "it's fine or that it's cool" including what you wear and what you say to us and the men that you pick. Ironic thing is that I am working on putting this Porn Nation thing together for campus, when honestly, I just need the show to myself. If no one shows up to this thing, it will be a success because I will be there.
7) I do not care about anyone but myself.
8) I do not trust anyone right now. I have been hurt. Vulnerability has led to one of three things and they each hurt equally: a) Vulnerability has led to an outpouring of my own heart and my own soul with nothing to show for in return. Like the Olympic athlete who trains for 8 years for his one moment, but injures himself in the pregame stretches. b) Vulnerability has been used against me in the future. c) Vulnerability never fully served it's purpose in correcting wrongs, but it simply found more company in my misery.
9) Tomorrow morning, I will hate (literally) myself even more that I had expressed all of this. And I will read faces tomorrow morning who have ready this, and an air of awkwardness will fill our space, to the point where you will break it by saying "So I read your blog..." awaiting my response or even worse, "How are you doing?" not owning up to the fact that you have read my mind's soul, playing dumb to the realities that face the conversation's full capacity to be uncomfortable.

I do not want you to be my Savior. I do not want you to be my shoulder to cry on. I do not want you to make me feel any better. I just want you to know that whether you see me as Joe Schmo, self-righteous, nominal, apathetic, leader, friend, or enemy, I will not be your fairy tale ending or your fairy tale hero with a blog that tries to make sense of this crazy world. I go to church, but I am not mad at the preacher. I do not go because someone has forced me or my parents have given me to habit to live by, but because I want to. I am not so glazed over by the impressive lights and Christian contemporary soft rock that I have forgotten its truths. I go to church, but I am also not perfect. We say that too stinking much and everyone knows that, but there are times (there I go again) when I just believe that I suck. And I know that grace and glory to God is the ending, but it's like watching Rocky 4 for the 45th time. You know Rocky will prevail, but that does not mean that the tension does not exist. In fact, it is real. Very real. Apollo Creed dying hurts. And I'm in that moment.

This life thing...it hurts. I'm in that "I SUCK" moment. Don't make it your life mission to take me out of it. Don't pretend you understand. But for crying out loud, learn, know, and remember that it does happen and it can exist. I can no longer listen to another Christian heavyweight who covers him or herself up with so much fluff of Christian phrases that it begins to make me feel guilty for being human. Sometimes, I don't want to be a Christian and I can honesty relate with people who do not want to be either. It seems as if Chris Tomlin, the Passion of the Christ, and the book of Romans take away our humanity rather than give us more of it.

Allow me then to stand on my blogging pedestal on top of the Internet world, and declare that I'm human, I'm living, I'm breathing, and by God, I am struggling! Please block away every piece of advice you are preparing for me. Let me just ask you one question. Just one.

Is there anyone out there who will cut the crap and just be human with me?

Is that my voice cracking?

It has taken a long, arduous 20 and a half years, but the time has finally come. I have finally went through puberty and become a man. The voice has become deeper and the hair is growing on my arms. The muscles are coming in and I think I grew an inch today. Have I successfully moved you into a fantasy realm that is a few levels past the land of Narnia yet? No? Well, good. Because the fact remains that my voice is still a high baritone, my hair is smoother than every white woman I know, I'm still a midget, and and whenever I am showering, I suddenly have a craving to watch Robin Williams' Flubber. Nonetheless, I stand by my statement that I have become a man.

Almost overnight, I have snuck into the back of a van, huddled closely to a dozen minorities in the dark, and crossed the border into Playboy and Budweisers. The realization came at me like raindrops on a sunny day, like a junior high school friend who hasn't talked to me in 8 years facebooking me, like poop coming out when you expect gas. Many people have begun asking me this one question, and I have even asked myself this question from time to time: "What are you thinking?" or "What's going on?" or some other variation. And these days, I can look at anyone in the eye, and honestly say the most truthful male answer I have ever heard. Nothing.

I never knew when I would finally reach this point, but now I can take off my pampers and screw Gerber in the face. I can act like an idiot, jump on top of a table, and declare the utter vacancy of my mind. Maybe once in a while, I'll come up with a good idea of how to say "hello" to one of the female persuasion, or I may grunt when Jack Bauer sticks a needle in the villain's neck, but for the most part, I will be sitting still and still thinking about absolutely nothing, except that nothing at this point, means everything to me.

I feel like a Buddhist who has reached the nothingness of enlightenment.

Makeover

You ever just get bored of yourself? Like you've ridden this roller coaster too many times, or seen this movie a little bit too much? Granted, it may be a great movie like A Christmas Story, but after 12 times in one day on TNT, you're thinking to yourself, "OKAY THIS IS A LITTLE BIT MUCH!" So now that it has been twenty years, I'm getting a little bored. They tell me that college is the perfect time to find who you are, your identity, and all that junk. But coming out of Stuyvesant High School in New York City, living through six homes, two continents, and a couple of national tragedies, I was pretty sure of who I was awhile ago.

I am a confused Christian. I am an Asian-American, but I'll just call myself hyphen. I like conflict, a lot. I have more passion for the New York Knicks than any subject, any girl, any relative, any god. Silence is louder than heavy metal. Music is my life. I like to be alone. I have tremendous mood swings. I like to make proclamations and declare ephiphanies though I don't really have them. I have been overweight since the 4th grade. I like myself a lot. But even this is getting boring.

Part of me wants to worship at a mosque, so that I can be a confused Muslim for a day as I turn up the volume from the prayer chants of the iman over the Chris Tomlin album. I want to paint myself green and run around on all fours. I'm going to root for the Atlanta Hawks or the Houston Texas or the Tampa Bay Devil Rays. I'm going to go to the woods (and by woods in New York, I mean the two trees in the backyard) and not talk for 6 hours. I'm going to the dance club and just stand there in the middle of the dance floor, motionless, until I feel like it and I will bust a move for 5 seconds before I retreat back into a still form. I will start saying "Eh who cares?" when I'm excited or "Oh" and nothing else when I am curious. I wonder how sane I would be if I simply sat on a wooden chair for days, only getting up to eat crackers, drink water, and pee.

I am desperate for me to leave myself. I want to shut this movie off, roll back these eyelids as the screen goes black. So that while I am hibernating, the fab 5 can come over and makeover more than my clothes, but change who I am. Cause I'm tired and bored. Maybe that's why gays are getting all the tv shows and the women. But I digress. I have already reached my midlife crisis, not asking myself is this all there is to life, but I'm asking myself is this all there is to me?! Because if this is it, I'm missing a lot of the adventure, the passion, the mystery of it all. That's it. While others are preoccupied finding the mystery of a woman, a man, a god, a science, or a universe, I need to realize first that there is a mystery in me.

I do not want to fall out of love with myself to the point, where I'm spending Friday nights alone with myself, finishing off my own sentences, when the inevitable has happened: the clanking of the silverware has drowned out the voices in my head. I want to be able to surprise myself with a new farting sound, a poem so good it amazes myself, bring myself flowers in the middle of the night, and share secrets with myself that are both painful and yet soothing. I want to link arms with myself and show myself off at all the joints, so my friends can be like, "Dang, where'd he find a booty like that?!" and girls would be like "Wow, suddenly, Yih looks pretty good now that he's with someone."

But these feelings have come and gone. Almost as if my life were running parellel with Nick's and Jessica's, the newlywed season is gone, and I want a divorce from myself. No, I actually just want a break from myself, till I'm no longer bored of myself, till the gut on myself is a little smaller, the air with myself is a little fresher, the skin on myself is a little smoother, and the conversations with myself are a little longer.

Till then, I think I'm clear in this post what I need. A date.

Go To Your Room

i've heard those words too many times. Just never in my own family. I've watched my friends ' enormous homes and by friends, I mean Zack Morris, Carlton Banks, and these days, Seth Cohen. Their parents keep getting mad at them and exclaims, "Go to your room!" Since that is one of my few windows into the upperclass world, I suppose that's how many families are, even if they are not. Apparently, parents say this because they are think that the room was enough punishment and they wouldn't like it. Or that they are afraid that if they stayed close to their children, they might just lose it. Or some hoped that if their children went to their room, the children would calm down and come back with a different attitude. In my case, my parents just slapped me. I got scared and stopped. And that's why I don't do drugs. To be clear, I do believe in corporal punishment. But that's not the point.

The point is that I've never been sent to my room. I've never had a room to go to. I slept in a hammock, graduated to my parents bed, and lived with siblings ever since. Some days, I had wished for just a little privacy. It didn't even need to come with locks and keys, but just space. Showers seemed to be the answer, but then again, I couldn't waste too much water. I envied peers who had a bigger room than my own parents. Therefore, I never understood why parents would send their children to them rooms. You got in trouble, so go have some privacy. You broke the vase, so you don't get spanked. You stole from the minimart, so stop having a relationship with me.

Now that my family is made of only adults, and my brother and sister-in-law are about to have a baby, I have using this break as a time to look at parenting and how it works in some cases, but not in others. When it comes to rooms, somewhere along the way, I think parents got it wrong. In comparison with parents, when I make a mistake, my Father says, "You! Come here now!" He runs to me when I just slap in the face or curse him out, and proud of it. His arms are wide open, jolting and chasing after me with tears of passion running down his face while I mock and spit back. Instead of sending me to my room, he demands me at His room. I wonder how it would look like if parents stopped saying, "Go to your room," and began saying, "Come here, come to my room."

As each day passes, the lack of space in my childhood reveals itself to be more of a blessing than a curse.