Friday!

Hey Guys,

It's Friday, Friday, going to get down on Friday... Just joking that is probably the worst culture thing right now is that video (look up Friday on YouTube if you want to know what I mean). Friday is a major day in the week it seems though. It is the last day in the business week, the last day before the weekend and the first day to relax and have fun! Kinda of. Maybe I am crazy but Friday does not seem like any special for me. It might once I actually get a job and also move on with my life but right now there is no difference between Monday or Friday. Even when I was growing up the way I was raised is that although Saturday was a day off your job it did not mean a day of doing nothing. There were jobs, tasks and work still to be done. Even tomorrow, I probably will wake up earlier then normal because there are tasks to be done. So how come there is such a fixation upon Friday?

Well it is a simple answer actually it is a day the represents a change, getting away from out day to day task and allows us to do what we want. The day represents that we do not have to wake up early the next morning and go to work or school. I just do not see the big deal of it all, like did I miss something growing up that Friday night was this magical night where you are allowed to forget about everything you have to still do? 

Anyone who does not know I am not much of a party go'er. I do not particularly enjoy going out to clubs, drinking or anything along those lines. It just seems that is what Friday and Saturday has become in my age just an excuse to go out because there is nothing going on tomorrow. Maybe I should thank my parents for that because all I can view tomorrow as is a full day to get tasks done. Just a short blog post as I am going to bed early :)

What are you doing with your Friday? What are you going to do tomorrow?

Goodbye for now,

Christian Sawka

Learning about Depression

Hey Guys,

Today I had a pretty funny experience that I would like to share with you all. Today in my Psychology class I learned about depression, anti-depressants and therapy. It was about the weirdest feelings I have ever had. I was reading the text book, listening to Doug Hampson and watching the YouTube clips he had provided. It was all extremely real to me. There was no reaction like WOW that must suck to go through like I normally have when learning about psychology. You hear about people losing parents, eating disorders, and everything like that and all you can do is sympathize. When I was reading the textbook and learning all these different techniques all I could think about was my own life. No long where these disorders or conditions on paper but I had experienced them and lived them out. It changes your opinion, Doug ask the question what would you prefer. I sat there and though what did I prefer, what did I receive, and started getting a little uncomfortable.

The reason I was uncomfortable was not because I felt bad or like crap but because of someone that was brought into our class a few weeks before. This guy went through hell, his entire life was horrible and filled with every temptations a man could face. He shared about us about when he was debating taking his own life and his own experience. I sat there is complete silence even after the class Doug mentioned that I was quiet, I shared with him later why. The reason why I was quiet and the reason I was uncomfortable today is these two ideas:

One, that even though I have had so many blessing in my life and a great life I still came to the same place as I guy who faced hell. Let me explain my life, my dad will do anything to support me, my mom loves me everyday and always will and my sister is my biggest fan. I have always been given everything I have wanted and yet still I went through a strong depression. I still got to the point of not want to live. Scary how powerful our brain is? it can create any doubt, fear or failure.

Two, that now learning about depression, therapy and ways to get help has created a bigger realism about it all. Sometimes I talk about my depression and everything like it was a distant past. As though it happened years ago. It was 5 months ago I almost killed myself, 3 months ago I was on Anti-depressants and 2 months ago I was going to counselling every week. That is not a long time ago at all. Today taught me that, that my past although it is my past was still not that long ago.

I do have to say though learning about what you went through it a great thing. I would suggest anyone who has gone through anything to learn about it, understand and figure out everything. I am going to post from now on once a week about "Learning about Depression" how to figure it out. Today made me realize that I still do not understand everything that went on. What caused me to view myself as a failure? What caused me to feel like I am not good enough? What caused me to lose all hope? I was CHALLENGED in psychology to class today that I need to understand what went on more while continuing to grow and move past it.

By the way, I love to hear what you guys think, comment, share or follow it encourages me to stay open, honest and truthful about what depression was like.

Goodbye for now,

Christian Sawka

Social Media

Hey Guys,

Something that is growing in our society, although it may be past its explosion it is still something so integrated into our culture. Facebook is probably the most well known but there are an ever increase amount of ways to "communicate" via social media. If it is through Twitter, Blogs, Facebook, YouTube or other social media outlets this is our new generation of communication. Being a business major they are teaching us that this is the new form of advertisement, this is the new form of marketing and this is the future. BUT I pose this question, should this be our future? I am not saying that Facebook, or instant chat is a horrible thing. The positives of globalization social media far out weigh the negative. However there are some looming negatives that are at hand. We are a culture that knows the least amount of each other. I am at huge fault for this. Think about it for a second either your communication through email, or instant chat, how often do you miss sarcasm, tone or just the mood of a conversation? Even within these last few days I can think of two to three times where conversations or messages have been mistook based upon just social media. Something is lost in that translation. 

Should this be our future? I myself do not think that it should be our future, however I think it is a reality that this is going to be our future. It is unfortunate. The reason I say this is unfortunate is because you miss so much when you miss the most important part of communication. Which are non-verbal communication or body signals. I always find it shocking when people get "shocked" about something going on to their close friend. Now I am not perfect and I always make mistakes but I believe that we miss so much today. We miss when people are struggling, we've learned so much how to put a front up especially online and especially hide our true emotions. When I was going through depression I stopped communicating to people through real forms of communication and just talked online. This is because you can always limit what you say online, even right now I can control how much I share.

Especially when I was younger I use to love and still love going online the reason is because you can be whoever you want, you can take away any flaw you want and be something more than you think you are. One of the reason I loved the play World of Warcraft is because you can create the character you want to be and be any personality you want. Let me bring this back to social media again, I think it is another way to create any image you want and hide your weak points. It is a rarity that you are going to see someone post a status that says something of personal meaning where they are truly struggling. It sucked when I was going through depression because it is ten times easier to put up a front or something you were not then what was going on. That is my fear with social media because instead of promoting being really who you are it helps us create/show something we are not.

Or then again this might just be me; I am nowhere near perfect :)

Goodbye for now,

Christian Sawka

Remember to comment, share and follow. It helps me out a lot with just encouragement and everything else.