Measures to take when confronting an emotionally devastating individual.

One of the highlights of this year: I had a chance to know a person (anonimously reffered to as "Person" in the following) who at first seemed energetically active and optimistic, but it was not that way when time proved the underlying true nature within Person.

Have you ever felt extremely depressed when having a supposedly light chit-chat with someone?

Have you ever felt degraded when listening to somebody's comments or stories?

Have you ever felt meticulously, though subtly, interrogated in such conversation?

Have you ever got bored of listening to the same repeated stories that along the way have been losing its charm and interest?

And...have you ever felt being compared with by your interlocutor?

All these sensations came in a form of an emotionally disturbing conversation with Person, one of a few individuals who are capable of emitting a destructive energy towards me.

All in all, Person is the one who has power to obliterate (unintentionally though it might be)your morale and courage if you stand in his/her way.

I am sure that Person is not the only one of its kind. Person is everywhere and in every society, though a rare chance to meet someone like Person is so thin that we think they don't even exist. But the truth is... they are around us.

Person would start the conversation by mentioning his suffering-but-worth-it past that Person had had in this you-know-where country years ago and then would fill you up with all the minor details that Person could ever think of. At first, all of this seemed super-interesting and I was really attentive. Days and months went by, the conversations though followed the exactly repetitive same pattern and, of course, old content.

When Person began to brag about his/her successful professional life, his/her fight against enemies, his/her connections with other people and how hard his/her life had been, you started to realize how boring this could be. Especially, when it was time that Person asked, for TWENTIETH time, such annoying questions that you had never thought you would hear from someone so "successful" like Person: How is your academic life? Where have you been travelling? How is your work? How much you get paid? How much money do you have in your bank account? (This one, though, Person wouldn't ask directly but instead would tell you the digits in his own account and look at you, waiting for you to do the same).

The questioning would end with an expected serie of unsurprising, yet annoying, comments: Why don't I have as much money as you do? Why haven't I ever travelled as much? Why haven't I ever experienced such romantic love like you do? Why, why, why... Every "Why" only concerned Person, no one else. Just Person.

Person always compared himself (or herself) with everybody, only to feel more motivated to dedicate himself (or herself) harder to become better (or superior) in any way than you.

Person would tactically slow the pace of his (or her) competitor by describing in detail the hard labours Person was up to at the moment and showing you how dedicated he was to get to his goal, all of which would make you feel like a lazy idiot who had hardly done anything in specific. The impact would finally discourage you and put you to a mentally-coma state.

You would end up feeling totally discouraged by the negative power Person had given you.

You would take days to recover from this effect.

Possible solution for a faster recovery: alleviate the destructive energy from Person seeded in yourself by sharing it to someone else; talk to your best friends and vent about what you have been through. That helps a lot... at least for me.

These are only few examples of what Person is capable of doing. There are much more courage-draining behaviours one could ever think of.

Until next time, just keep away from Person, who could be anyone around you, if you really care about your mental health.

Remember, Person is everywhere.

13.23
Sunday 16th, July, 2006

1-year break... Whoops! That was more than enough!

It's been more than one full year that I haven't updated my blog.

All the reasons that I can come up with can be extracted into one reasonable excuse; I didn't have time.

Last September, I decided to embark on a grand certificate-hunting mission by enrolling in a course of Hispanic Studies as a Diploma which would take away all of my precious spare time I had always had in the first year.

My routine activities were no more than waking up, going to class, coming back for lunch, doing homeworks, going to another class, coming back for dinner, doing more homeworks and going to bed.

Not that I didn't have any chance to get relaxed by going somewhere else, but I just couldn't travel as much as I had done the year before. And that was excruciatingly boring.

However, I tried to make the most out of the little time I had to see the world. Italy, Greece and Valencia the main destinations I travelled to during this academic year, not to mention another trip to Barcelona and Paris with my family :)

Well, as summer approches, now I eagerly await for my next well-planned trip to London and Edinburgh with my best thai friend, Manao. I'm so sure that it's going to be one of the most expensive and least comfortable trip that I have ever taken, taking in to account the ridiculously high cost of living of this british metropolitan. Anyway, we'll enjoy it, I'm sure of that.

Actually I have loads of interesting stories in my mind waiting for their turn to be told, but I hardly have organized what to write first and later. That's why I decided to begin first with this introduction before I really come up with the reviews of what you guys have missed during this period!

So... see ya on the next post! :)