The Why I Write These
Still thinking about purpose. Or rather why. I once asked why in a meeting after someone presented an idea and that person went off. Why, why? Do we need a reason? A justification for the things we do? Think? Want? Hate? Love? Or is the action enough of the why. So I started thinking about why I write these. They’re just straight from the top thought flows of whatever may be on my mind that day. When there are big gaps between these posts people ask me, “Why haven’t you been writing?” But now I’m asking myself, “Why am I writing?”
I started these posts after a meditative writing class that was recommended by my screenwriting teacher. She told me 30 minutes, non-stop, no editing, let it all out, first thing in the morning. It was a challenge. I get why people do the 30 day challenges now. There was a goal. A task to tackle as soon as I woke up in the morning. Recently single. No kids. It was my only responsibility to myself. I haven’t taken the time to go back and see if my writing has changed. Not even sure if it’s been a year yet. Maybe a little longer. I never really thought about the why when I wrote. I never thought about an audience. I just assumed I had none. I wrote freely. I expressed anger, doubt, frustration, insecurities, and hopefully hope. I reminisced and I looked forward. It was the only place where I felt like I could be all those things and not be judged. Not shut down. Not discouraged. Not encouraged. Sometimes we just want to express. Throw a rock in the ocean. Not for attention. But just to do it.
Now I think I write to express all those things above. In our get-more-likes-press-a-heart-button culture we want to put our best selves forward all the time. It’s like every photo and every Tweet is our very first date. We want to impress. And after we impress we want to keep impressing and we want to over impress. We don’t want to lose likes. We don’t want to lose followers. We want more and more. It makes us feel good. It makes us feel relevant. It’s our reward from the world that we matter. That’s why when people see me they ask if I’ve been traveling. Maybe I travel a lot. Don’t feel like I do. Especially when I compare myself to some of my friends. But when I travel is when I post the most photos on social media. I want you to know that I travel to all these cool places. Makes me seem like a man of the world. Even if I’ve never been to most parts of the world. That’s the reality. The sociality is that I’m always away. Because life away is always better than life present. Even when you live in a city like New York. I post less now. Take less photos. Care less about the likes. I used to. Didn’t we all at some point? Doesn’t mean I’m not enjoying life. Doesn’t mean that I am either. Just means I’m not posting as much. People read a lot into social media activities.
I come here to share the things that I don’t or can’t on social media. We’re complicated. Emotionally and mentally. As much as I want to think that I’m a simple man like the man that I thought my dad was for so long, I’m not. And neither he is. He’s simple in that it doesn’t take much to make him happy. I envy that. I wish I was that way. I’m working towards it. Trying to get rid of things. Trying to possess less. Trying to buy less. Trying to see more things as luxuries and less things as necessities. I want more to want less.
There aren’t many places for men to express ourselves. I don’t mean the hyper-masculine machismo things. I cringe at some of the stuff I see on social media expressed by men. I’m sure some cringe at some of the stuff I Tweet too. I haven’t been able to unfollow them tho. I’ve always been fascinated with the way people think. And social media is a great place to get a piece of that. A piece because it’s only that, it’s rarely the whole. Especially the younger guys, I think, was I like that? And if I was, thank God there was no social media then. You know what, I probably was like them. I used to put a lot of value in my ability to date or even be seen with certain type of women. To the point that in my 20s I was known as that Asian dude with beautiful brown women. I hesitated even writing that. It felt weird to write that. But that’s the truth. That’s who I was. Access to music industry events was my calling card. Vibe Magazine was my business card. Some of my male friends’ girlfriends’ joked that they didn’t want them to hang out with me because I always surrounded myself with beautiful women.
I watch rap videos differently now. Am I mature? Or just old? These guys need all these half-naked women shaking their asses to make them feel powerful, to make them feel like a man, to show the world that they are the man. Meanwhile the whole song is about how they can’t find a good girl and how all the women they meet are hoes. Not that being in a rap video makes you bad girl or a hoe. It’s just strange signals being sent out. It’s probably been this way forever. But just now I’m able to process it. My lady asked me if I was a feminist. A few years ago I would have said hell no. But now maybe I am. Or close to it. How do you know?
Like most guys I always thought feminist meant hating men. Kind of like how white folks are cool with you being against racism but ain’t cool with you being Pro-Black or anything Pro-specific to a race. The word made me insecure. The word would automatically put me in a defensive stance. Not even defensive. Full attack mode. I would come out swinging. I’d like to think that I’ve grown in that regard. You can thank the intelligent, strong, beautiful women I’ve fallen in love with over the years for cracking my fragile male shield. They paid the price for it though. I fought like hell not to change. You can ask my current Love. I’m still fighting. Sorry Love. Why am I fighting tho? Should I even try to answer that? Should I even think about that?
I write now to show the opposite side of the social me. I want to show the messy and the ugly. If I’m cocky on social, I want to show the vulnerable on here. I got over 4,000 followers on Twitter. I have no idea why. I don’t know if I’d follow me. I’m such a mixed bag. But that should be OK. That’s what I like about myself. Am I allowed to say that I like certain things about myself? Are men allowed to say that? Are men of color allowed? I want my writing to be like the B-Side. The slow jams side. The side that maybe people never got to after the A-side. But you could always revisit the B-Side. The die hards always swear the B-Side was better anyway. This ain’t the remix.
