A Better Tomorrow

For those who don't know, I'm a person who's usually secluded from others, and one who finds enjoyment in doing so. You might classify that person in many types: a loner, a person who doesn't know how to communicate with other people, a weirdo, or as someone who just doesn't want to talk to people. If I'm ever going to classify myself into one of those four classes, I would choose the second one—being a person who can't easily keep a conversation going after 10 minutes—but I think I can fit well into the 3rd one. This is just going to be a short post (I hope), I still have my advocacy speech to write about.

Being a person with little to no social life at all (for me) is a grueling experience. There are those who don't have a social life in school, but they do have one at home with their parents, and, obviously, you can immediately tell that I have neither one of them. Now, not having a social life is optional, and it's an option for me as well—in fact, it's the only option.

Now why is that? Well, it's because of high school (and a few other things). I did make friends with people in high school, but the problem was I trusted most of them very easily, and things kind of got out of hand when most of them started spreading my secrets around and stuff. Not a lot of them really cared that much (I mean, even I wouldn't be interested in the secret of the kid who was always alone sitting in the back), but it was still a major offense to me. Anyway, long story short, I only trusted a few people, kept only a few friends, and my list of real friends kept on dwindling down until college.

I've made a lot of friends in college, but there was just one problem: no one really know me, and I really didn't know them. There are a few who know me and my story, but there are others who I don't really know. The problem lies in the fact that I'm too scared to open up to others. I'm scared that, whatever happened in high school, might happen again.

But I realized something this morning: so what? So what if most people know I do this and that? So what if my suicidal past gets passed around? So what if people know I'm not emotionally stable? If you look at it, it's actually very beneficial because the people who judge easily will immediately stay away from me, while I can see the others who really want to approach me and be friends with me—the ones who take the time to get to know me despite my various flaws. Quite simply, the people who easily judge others based on something they've heard are the ones that I shouldn't form friendships with, and the people who know my flaws, know my problems, and yet continue to try to be friends with me are the ones I should really be friends with.

Who would you rather have as a friend? The one who knows the flaws in people and immediately stays away from them without getting to know the person first or the person who knows the flaws in people and yet still tries to get to know them and form a friendship?

People are different, and the statement aforementioned can't be applied to everyone.

Going back, the problem really is that there are people who want to get to know me, and can't do so because of the restrictions I have in place. As GLaDOS once said, "The best solution to a problem is usually the easiest one." And the easiest answer is to just stop being so overprotective, loosen up, and let the light shine back in my life.

So, as of today, (most) of the stories from my life and (some) aspects of me will be shared with (almost) anyone, just as long as I can make sure that the person who wants to know doesn't look like one who will easily spread rumors around. Even if my secrets and stories got spread, the real question at the end of the day is "Would anyone really care?"

By now, it has become obviously clear that I have lost sight of what really matters in life and what is my purpose in it. This problem isn't really anything new, it's just your average case of "existential crisis" from a teen suffering it at an early age. Now, having an existential crisis at an early age is an extremely horrible thing to experience.

I don't know how mine usually started, but I know that it began when I slowly lost sight of the dream—the dream that I have of building a better and brighter tomorrow. It might sound silly to you, possibly because it's something that a 3rd grader would say ("I want to change the world when I grow up.") but it's actually a very strong vision to me. The vision of a more peaceful, a more prosperous, and a more hopeful future is the only large-scale dream I have (that and a few other unnecessary ones).

But honestly speaking, ever since I was little, I've always been fascinated with technology and the future. I fancied myself the idea of living in a modern a minimalist future filled with flying cars and a ubiquity of holograms, all with a shade of pure white and bright cyan. As I grew older, this vision of a better tomorrow manifested into a dream, which turned into an idea, which lead me to the pursuit of the same vision I had years ago. It's a far-flung dream from reality, but hey, you are free to chase down whatever dream you have in your short time on this earth—and I believe you should chase it, especially if it aims to help humanity as a whole.

However, no matter how hard I chase down my dream, at the end of the day I'm still human. I broke down in sadness, I was sometimes put my own lustful desires ahead of the dream I wanted to pursue, and, worst of all, I constantly experienced moments of pure laziness and a willing feeling of not just doing anything. Residing to laziness is something I often did, and, honestly speaking, it made me comfortably accept the idea that things will always turn out for the worst. So I resided myself to the idea of this horrible future and it's because that future doesn't expect anything of me today.

That is, of course, until opportunity knocked at my doorstep. Like a survivor trying to free himself from the rubble, hope—time and time again—has risen out of the darkness and made its way into my life. This time, it came in the form of a website, Microsoft DreamSpark.

It was an average Monday night for me, one filled with wallowing over a failed quiz in calculus, in which I got one of the lost grades in the entire block. Distraught, I immediately tried to find my forte, as I thought that there must be something I excelled at. I looked at my course and, without hesitating, I turned to programming. Although programming isn't something I'm inherently good at, I'm sure that I can learn it and, if I put my mind and will to it, I know that I'm going to excel on it someday.

I immediately searched for programming tools that are free of cost for students and, lo and behold, Microsoft DreamSpark was one of the top search results. Although my college doesn't really support the program itself, I still thought that I could still apply to it. After all, it did say that it was open to all students willing to get a head start in programming. I took out my Lumia, took a photo of my registration form along with my details, and sent it on its way.

In less than 24 hours, I got this email:



I was ecstatic when I got that email. I felt like things were going to finally start out well for me and I'm now finally able to get myself out of this rut in my life. I got the tools, and now I need to learn how to dig myself out of this.

As you can see, that email was sent more than 2 weeks ago, and my progress in programming has since dwindled as the usual disappointment from calculus piled up, not to mention that I have 6 days of classes every week, and I only had access to programming tools at home. My laptop is broken beyond repair (although it's still useful but suffers from slowdowns every now and then) so I can't really test out the skills I've learned while I'm at APC (Asia Pacific College).

One reason of this is because I don't have any access to any computers during my free time. As much as I would love to, I don't really have proper access to any programming tools in APC aside from using them in my designated subjects—which is just a small 8 hours compared to the average of 44 hours I spend a week in APC, not to mention the additional 2 and a half hours I spend every single day getting to and from my college, which totals to about 15 hours per week. If only I was able to allocate, at the very least, an additional 4 or 6 hours a week at APC learning how to code, I would've already known the fundamentals of the Java and C# programming languages.

Nevertheless, I still had around 109 hours left at home. So, at the end of the day, it's all my fault if I don't learn programming. At this point, I'm really considering taking time management skills or I should find meaning and purpose in the things I do and the things I want to do.

Regaining sight of the dream I want to pursue is not easy, nor is being able to implement it. But still, I'm always thinking of that famous movie quote that went, "Most dreams don't come true on their own, you have to make them true. Takes a lot of work, not easy, but not impossible either."

We all have that friend who shares almost the same set of interests as us, or someone who likes something as much as us. For me, that person is my big sister, +Elaine Avriele Santos. Obviously, it's great to have a friend like that, but what happens when you've been friends for such a long time and yet you both haven't met?


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Before starting, let me give you some context about my friendship with the lovely Elaine Avriele. 3 or so years ago, I was part of this group on Facebook which was essentially this sort of fan club for this book series (which I seemed to love a few years ago). I was already a Sone (the term for a fan of the Korean girl group Girls' Generation)  back then and, for some reason, I wanted to know if there are any fans of Girls' Generation in the group. To my absolute surprise, 2 persons commented on my post. The first one was, of course, Elaine and the second one was her friend.

During that time, things were just starting out for us. We didn't talk much, but we talked on a somewhat weekly basis. Things really didn't start until I accidentally tagged her in a photo because I had (yep, had) a friend who's also named Elaine, and Elaine talked to me about the tag and I removed it, and that's where it all began, apparently.

A few more weeks later, we were talking to each other nonstop. She was constantly telling me that Taeyeon is a better bias because of her voice and because she's the leader or the group; while I, on the other hand, was telling her that Jessica is a better bias because she has a smoother and more mellow voice compared to Taeyeon's extreme voice. You know, real Korean fan stuff.

Over the years, we slowly talked to each other and we learned a little more about each other. It's not much, but it accumulated into a big thing over time. Until it got to the point where she slowly helped me in my day-to-day activities, and she even protected me one from a friend that had been treating me horribly.

She has helped me a lot over the course of our friendship, and yet I barely helped her with things—which is why I owe her a huge debt of gratitude, not to mention that she happily accepts me as her little brother. As her little sibling, as if I'm one of her kind. It might not look much to you, but for me, it means a lot.
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And that's how Elaine and I got where we are now—as the best of friends who are almost inseparable.

Although I have to admit that, over time, I have made some mistakes like any other human, but the fact that she openly welcomes me as her little brother after all of these years, and I'm quite thankful for that. Not because that she treats me like I'm someone special (sort of), but because of her existence as a whole.

Elaine, through my eyes, represents many good things in this world: a friend you can open up to, a friend who's shoulder you can cry on, and as someone who's willing to catch you whenever you fall. To you, an average person with a lot of friends you can count on, she might not seem much; however, through my eyes, she is one of (if not, the) kindest persons I've ever met during my 16 years on this earth.

I suppose she represents something bigger as well. In a world full of chaos, violence, and all sorts of evil, we need someone we can rely on—someone who can catch us whenever we fall. And, quite honestly, Elaine fills in this gap by just simply being there. As a person who currently suffers from a lot of insecurities and problems, a person I can count on is someone I need the most, and Elaine truly does bring back the colors in my life.

In all honesty, we didn't talk much last year, and we just started talking again last week or so, but she's one person I NEVER want to stop talking to.

Like most people, Elaine isn't perfect, and I am proud to say that neither am I. However, she's the most perfect big sister I could ever have—and I love her for that (:

If you have been reading my previous blog posts, you could immediately sense the main theme or gist of the said posts: stating problems without properly giving solutions nor addressing the problems themselves. I have to admit I'm an extremely lazy person, and not the good kind either. A good lazy person will find an easier solution to a problem (just like what Bill Gates said); on the other hand, a bad lazy person (like me) won't find a solution to a problem at all (or, if ever, I will just look for a solution on Google but not follow it). Laziness is a problem that I have been facing since I was a child. From not wanting to get up and eat, to not wanting to get out of bed at all.

Laziness itself has caused a significant impact on my life—social and academic. I have this innate feeling of just wanting to sleep in bed or just lie there for a few more hours rather than do anything else. Honestly speaking, as I'm writing this, I'm getting that same exact feeling. But I digress, I need to learn how to solve those problems and I'm going to lay all of them out here in the open today.

So, without and further ado, let's get started.




Solution #1: Connection
More specifically, human connection. The problem with me is that I've shunned people away from me, and I don't want to form any actual close connections with anyone (as much as possible). Due to past experiences, I have tried to keep friends away and close off ties with people who are so close to me. It has become apparent that my way of living—passing by and meeting people without actually connecting to them—has caused severe repercussions towards me, my health, and my general well-being.It has become obvious to me that, by not actively connecting and sharing information with other people, the feeling of isolation and loneliness I'm getting has grown stronger over the past few months.

So, how can I actively and properly enforce this solution? By becoming fearless, I'll tell you that. Also, Ate Betina has told me that, if a relationship I have with a person went awry and that person tries to point out my name or share slurs about me online, I should just let it happen and don't mind it. In a way, it does make sense, becoming fearless of whatever happens in life is the way to go; moreover, keeping a calm and focused mind while bad things happen is definitely a step in the right direction.

"Sure, that's great and all, but what does it have to do with connection?" is what you might be wondering right now. See, I'm focusing on the two sides of connection: reconnection and disconnection. I need to disconnect from those people who just use me for their own personal gain and reconnect with people I have lost connection with.

In layman's terms, I'll just not talk to those people who are using me for their own benefit and focus on my real friends—the ones who are almost always by my side.

"And what does this solution do? Does it really solve anything?" is another question you might be wondering now. The most obvious answer to this question is that it removes every single trace of depression and loneliness I have. The answer of connection will solve my low self-esteem, low confidence, depression, loneliness, and so much more.


Solution #2: Finding a new inspiration
This is now the solution to my problem with laziness. Over the years, I was inspired by a lot of people around me, and they all made me want to continue doing what I love. An inspiration would a make a huge difference to my life, as I have someone to do something for. Anyone can be my inspiration, honestly speaking, from the friends I've gained in high school, to the man who started the company I love the most, and even my GRAMCOM professor. As Yoo Rhee Nam's speech titled "99% Inspiration," I need to find someone who can affect me and "change my life," and "shine a new light on my world."

And when I meant "new inspiration," I really meant a new inspiration—someone who hasn't inspired me before. This is not an easy task, as most people you come across in life aren't inspirational at all. I need to find a person who stands out of the crowd—and in a good way, of course. Someone who's fearless, caring, and kindhearted. I need a positive influence in life and, quite frankly, finding someone who will just serve as a bad example will only worsen my condition.

I need to find someone who I can look up to, a starlight that can guide me. I might seem like a mature teen who can pretty much do things on his own, but deep down inside, I'm just really a scared child who doesn't know where to go. An inspiration would be a big deal for me and it most definitely will make a big impact on my life.


Solution #3: Learning what path to take in life
I'm a man of simple goals and simple aspirations. Ultimately, my main goals in life are as what follows: find a nice girl, court her, marry her, find a nice place, have kids, raise them properly, not abandon them, continue to live life for them, grow old, and die surrounded by the ones I love. It's a pretty simple life plan, as I don't really plan on becoming the next Steve Jobs, or anything like that. A good father and good employee will do. The problem with my goals is that I have no clear path of what to take, or even how to get there.

Right now, I'm a student at Asia Pacific College who's in his first year of college. I just graduated from high school last March and 4 months of college doesn't really give me enough time to evaluate and see if this course is really right for me. The world of my major, Software Systems (or Systems Software), has yet to open up to me, but I hope that, by the time I see it, I will immediately love it.

I'm still not sure what to make out of this solution, and this is the one that baffles me the most. Even if I have solved all of my other problems (my depression, mood swings, connections, etc.), I still have one ultimate problem: finding out where to go in life. There are many paths to take in life, and there are many outcomes to them. For example, I could take the path of a dropout student who doesn't focus on his studies and yet I could still achieve some of the goals I planned—albeit, I'll become a deadbeat dad who'll just ultimately abandon his kids (and I would never want that to happen). I could also take the path to gaming, and try to do something out of place or something weird and I might make 3,000-12,000 Pesos a week by game streaming, but I'm sure I'll be extremely fat and lazy by that time.

So, the path I will take for now is the path of righteousness. By becoming a good friend and a good person to everybody (while, at the same time, avoiding those who will use me for their personal gain) is the path I should take. I should learn how to become a good person towards anybody and everybody, prioritize what matters the most, and ultimately learn how to put the solutions aforementioned into action.



And the only way to do that is through reorganization.

Unhappiness and misery are two of the emotions I feel the most, and obviously, I don't like either one of them. Like most people, I would prefer to be happy rather than be unhappy—but things aren't as simple as that.

Unhappiness (usually coupled with sadness and a hint of depression) is an emotion I'm all too familiar with. It is the worst emotion I have ever felt—much worse than rejection—and it's hard to solve on my own. Finding a solution for it might seem easy to say (which is to just stop being unhappy), but it's quite hard to do so. First off, I have several problems that cause me to be unhappy: college activities, studies, past experiences, financial troubles, and interpersonal relationships are just some of the things that keep me up at night. Not only does the emotion make me want to hate everything, it also makes me easily annoyed to anything. When I'm unhappy, I have no will or passion to do anything, and even if I do anything, it will always end up as a garbled mess—with little to no value whatsoever.

I've tried looking for the root of my unhappiness for weeks now, and I think I have finally found the root of it—isolation. For those who don't know, I'm a hermit, and I both love and hate staying in the comfort of my own solitude. I love to be alone so that I can focus on what I'm working on, but I also hate being alone when I have nothing else to do. Just like now, I have no one to talk to on Facebook, so I decided to write this blog post to kill some time.

Isolation and fear are two different words, if you compare them; however, they go hand in hand in order to cause my unhappiness. I'll talk more about isolation in another post (as it will take more time to write), and I'll focus more on fear, because it's easier to write. I'll break each topic down to 4 parts: the problem, the effects, the solution, and the possibility of solving the problem. As I said, I'm going to focus first on fear.


Fear is the reason why I don't want to trust people with my secrets. Fear is the reason why I have trust issues. Fear is the reason why I don't want to reveal my life story with anyone. Fear is the reason why I can't say no. The feeling itself can lead to so many effects, particularly trust issues and the inability for me to say no when it comes to favors. The issue of trust is caused by fear, because in the past I have shared so many things with my "friends," only for them to betray my trust and spread my secrets out to the world—which can lead to bullying and backstabbing if the secret itself falls into the wrong hands. The fear of trusting people is a serious issue and I still don't have a clue on how to solve it, Quite frankly, I've built so many "walls" around me that almost no one even knows my deepest and darkest secrets. I can only trust a few persons in this world—my best friend Capacia and his entire family being one of the few. I guess the solution for this is for me to just learn how to trust people and trust those who are really trustworthy—not just those friends I've met and I'll immediately tell my life story to (which I did back then, and it was all my fault).

The second (and most dangerous) effect fear can do is that, in a way, it makes me prone to accept favors—no matter what the costs are. This can lead to good things, sure, but it can also lead to abuse, especially when that person doesn't do anything to repay me back. I don't know if it's related to me being a Filipino, but I have this utang na loob (debt of gratitude) system where, if I do a favor for someone, I expect them to do something for me in return. Paying back someone for something that they did is not that bad, honestly, as it's only fair. That person (probably) sacrificed their time and effort (and, in some cases, money) for you, and giving your time and effort to them is the least you can do. It might sound like an odd thing for those who's just heard about it, but it's a clear example of mutualism. You benefit from the other person if and when that person does a favor from you, and that person benefits when you do a favor from that person. It's a win-win for both parties. Nevertheless, it always doesn't end in mutualism, and if it doesn't end in mutualism, it most likely will end in parasitism.

A person who benefits off of others and doesn't do anything to repay them back is, what I could call, a parasite (or a leech, whichever one you prefer). Let me just share with you my recent encounter of it a few days ago. I was tasked by my friend to make a background for their website (which was their midterm project) in Photoshop—nothing more, nothing less. I thought, "It's just a simple Photoshop request, I can do it." Little did I know that I would so make that person's entire project from scratch I handled most (around 90% or so) of the coding and work on the project itself. I spent a lot of time working on that little website. What made the experience worse is that the person didn't know how to properly code in HTML or CSS and yet that person had extremely high expectations. That person wanted me to showcase images in a light box, display multiple pictures (originally 800, stripped down to 90, and finally 30) in a single page. "If you can think of it, and if you want it, but you can't code it, you should learn how to code it yourself," was my main thought, but I was afraid to say so out of fear. So, after spending hours and hours of work on the project, what did it leave me with?

Nothing but more feelings of unhappiness and the feeling of being used. "Why did you do it in the first place anyway?" you might ask, and the answer to that question is none other than fear, the fear of losing our 3-year friendship, to be exact. That person and I have been friends for a long time, so I'd usually do pretty much any favor they ask me. BUT that person has recently started the trend of only talking to me when they need me. Which beings us to the age-old cliché "I only exist when you need something from me."



But I digress, my true friends told me that I shouldn't do that person's bidding anymore. So, under the supervision and under the advice from my closest companions, I blocked that person and removed them from my contacts. (Honestly, I didn't block that person myself, my close friend did it, and I regret nothing.) A sigh of relief immediately followed and I felt a lighter weight on my shoulders. My best friends were right, I shouldn't subject myself to do the work of others just because I'm afraid I might lose my friendship towards that person.

And that was my bold (no pun intended) first step towards conquering my various fears which can bring me unhappiness. I hope that, under the supervision and tutelage of my close friends, I can learn how to fight the fears that go bump in the night.


But that's just the beginning.

Since this blog is still in its infancy, I might as well make one of the first posts about the author; however, I'm not going to start with an elementary-tier introduction like my full name, age, schools I've went to, and so on. Rather, I'm going to introduce myself by telling you all who I was and who I am now.

After what seemed like an eternity, I have (finally) finalized the design of my blog! Whew, after weeks of preparation, code testing, coffee breaks, sleepless nights, and multiple HTTPS insecure errors, I have finally pulled off this daunting task—and I'm now ready to celebrate. So, for the time being, please listen to this celebratory song (courtesy of Girls' Generation, of course) that perfectly fits the emotions that I'm feeling right now.



To your professional web developer, the design of my blog might look, well, undercooked. But, to many of my blockmates and other people I know, the design of my blog actually looks great. While I agree with both, I have to say that I actually agree more with the first one—that my blogs design looks undercooked. Honestly speaking, the design of this blog is really finalized, but I haven't really tweaked it yet to its maximum capabilities. I still have some design inconsistencies here and there, and there are a lot of things I need to remove in the HTML of this blog.

Nevertheless, I've tried my best to make sure that this blog looks extremely professional and is well-suited for devices with smaller screens (unlike my other blog, Memoir of an Undergrad).


I've also made sure that this blog is fully HTTPS compatible by running several tests on it using the website Why No Padlock? as the main HTTPS compatibility checker for this blog. When I first made this blog, I wasn't even aware that Blogger supported HTTPS until I saw this post on my Blogger Dashboard talking about HTTPS availability for Blogger blogs.

I immediately enabled HTTPS availability and looked up an HTTPS compatibility checker. I found the site I mentioned earlier, and I tried to fix the errors that I saw. Funny enough, all of the Blogger blogs that supported HTTPS got the same error—that an insecure URL was found in the CSS of their blog. It was not hard to fix, I just added an extra "s" in the // link, downloaded it, replaced the URL, uploaded it to Dropbox, got a link, and replaced the original Blogger CSS link with the Dropbox link. Sure enough, I thought I had solved everything, but there was one problem left: according to the site, the server supports SSLv3, and that's (probably) a bad thing(?). I'm not sure, I'll understand what these mean someday, but I know that I don't control the server(s) hosting my blog, so I can't really disable it. I've done all I can to make sure this blog is fully HTTPS compatible, and I hope I did well for a college freshman.

Those being said, I still have a lot of things to do and a long way to go in terms of a "perfect" and fully professional design. I am far from actually finalizing the design of this blog—and it'll probably take me years to do so. Like I said earlier, several design inconsistencies and I've found a page where everything just looks broken. I have a lot of time to fix those errors, but now I'll just focus on the main purpose of this blog—to log my daily activities and share my story with others.

In my original blog, its main purpose was to see how much I've changed over time, and did I sure change a lot. I'm hoping to see a lot of (good) changes that I will apply to myself over time.

Ah, what a time it is to be alive. I have so many things to write about and so little time to write them (due to my somewhat busy schedule), but I'll make sure that I'll write in this blog every week. Until my next post, goodbye!


THRESHOLD 1
I just loaded my blog using Microsoft Edge (I use Google Chrome for web design and Microsoft Edge for personal browsing) and, wow, the transitions when resizing the page are so smooth. Also, I've fixed an issue with the share buttons.

THRESHOLD 2
Lots and lots of changes have been made and I almost forgot about this post. For starters, I added a blur to the slideshow on the home page AND I (kind of) blurred the top image for posts. I've fixed MULTIPLE design inconsistencies since then and I've added my own lines of code here and there. I've fixed some of the problems with the broken pages by enabling the loading screen to show up there. I've also added in a BSoD as the error page for 404 links. I've also fixed several issues when viewing my blog from multiple screen resolutions, so hopefully the people on Android won't see the images glitch or be extremely large.

There are seriously a boatload of new changes and fixes in this build compared to the base version of my blog. I've since added multiple hover effects, color transitions, accent color prevalence, and so on. Oh, and if you have a really keen eye on my HTML, you'll notice a few new things here and there. Maybe an easter egg when you search something in the search bar, I don't know.

The best part about all of the changes here is that I did most of the changes by myself and before my web programming class/es. Believe it or not, I actually spruced up everything here myself and I just relied solely on tutorials online and by the handy Inspect Element tool in Chrome.

My blog design looks finished now, but hopefully there are a lot of changes to come, especially after my web programming classes. I'm really proud of the changes I've made, and doing so many at a young age. I still have a long way to go in terms of becoming a professional web developer, but my blog is a testament on how far I've improved.