Nootropic Success

August 3rd, 2018

I finally found a combination that works. A set of pills that handles energy, clarity and mood – with the right dosage for a full day, also.

It begins with Adrafinil. I established that it works.

A few months back, I documented my use of Alpha-GPC and Coluracetam. I called Coluracetam a ‘mood lightener’ that worked for a few hours and Alpha-GPC didn’t do shit. It honestly had no affect on me.

That is UNTIL it combined with Adrafinil.

Adrafnil by itself was okay, last four hours, but clarity/energy was not 100%.

Two days ago, I took all three and I was in motion. The first day, there was some sinus and headache issues but by the second day it was perfect. I guess my mind getting use to the change.

Clear headed, energy and desire to ‘do’ things when I thought about them and with a good attitude. Got a lot of chores and projects done. Wonderful stuff. I mean, on the first day of taking all three, I was stumbling over myself because my mind was racing. I was OVER thinking and doing. By day two of all three, I got better control of it and can focus on what I chose to focus on.

One of the key problems with adult ADD, depression, etc is the inability to focus on task and, often, not having the desire to do anything — then things get backed up, you feel messed up that you’re not doing anything and then the depression kicks in. But you still don’t feel like doing anything because of the cloudiness and so everything cancels out.

This mixture is killer: I feel like doing and, most importantly, accomplishing everything.

I’m getting a lot done — and it’s NOT adderall.

I’m no chemist or physicist, but I know when something is working in my body. Alpha-GPC actually works in combination with the Adrafinil. So much so, that when the combination of all three starts to fade off in four-five hours, I popped one more Alpha-GPC and that activated me for the rest of the day; as if I took all three again.

The timing is like this:

6:30 am – Take all three pills.
11-12pm – Effects start to wane. Take one (1) Alpha-GPC
8pm – effects start to wane again.

Which is fine because it’s nearing time I go to bed. Here’s something that helped me the rest of the night: L-Theanine. People take that in combo to remove an edge to the jittery effects, but I don’t recommend taking it WITH your other pills because its just going to counter-act the purpose of having energy.

So, I take it to wind down from the day of using the other pills and I slept through the night. I tried it for the first time last night and finally stopped waking up at 3am. Yeah, I have been waking up at 3am for the past few days but that’s not because of the pills I’ve been taking. It was happening before the pills.

The L-Theanine is designed to promote relaxation and it did it’s job.

I’m happy with the results over the first two days. Today is the third and I’ll journal any downsides/effects moving forward. If you are interested in trying the exact set I’m on and where I bought it, here it is:

Adrafinil 300mg – Double Wood Supplements

Alpha GPC 300mg – Amazon

Coluracetam 20mg – Health by Naturals

L-Theanine 200mg – Amazon

Grade F

July 20, 2018

Rough week, but in two more weeks, this math class will be over. As it stands now, I am going to get an “F” in this class and I’ve been taking the past few weeks learning how to swallow that fact. No matter what I do, It’s not working. So, I expect the GPA to plummet.

In other news, I have been exercising each day, ramping up with incremental reps and sets of simple things: push-ups, morning runs, crunches, situps. The idea here is to break a bad habit of NOT exercising.

This is all about not letting things define who I am — nor letting things eat at me. I have been killing myself — hating myself — over the failure of getting this math that I’ve overlooked one simple fact: you can’t accomplish all things and define yourself poorly over one or two things.

For instance, I applied for a job recently that required I should not have a lot of debt, nothing bad on my credit report, etc, etc, etc. Some sort of ATM maintenance position.

I certainly didn’t qualify for this job; which used credit and debt as a gauge if I would be the kind to steal from them. They asked me some questions over the phone. At first, I lied about my debt and credit history. Then it started bothering me that they wanted to judge me on my credit to decide if I was going to be a thief.

I have NOT stolen from any company I ever worked at no matter how much debt I’ve been in. But, this company tried to define me by my debt and thinks I would steal. Meanwhile, people who seem not to be in debt, are stealing, and will likely get the job and steal from them. Suddenly, surprise, surprise. So-n-so is caught stealing and they went through all this judgment process to swear they wouldn’t be the type to steal.

I won’t be defined by what they think a thief is. I declined the position before it even got too far into it.

I’m getting an “F” in this math class. Does that make me stupid? Does that make me less smart? Bigger picture question: if I was to never get this degree, does that make me less smart?

No, of course not. At least to me. The rest of the world needs ‘things’ to define what a person is. A degree makes me smart, even though I have seen degree-holding idiots. Regardless, have the degree, get the job.

I’m done beating myself up over it and just pushing through. I can do exceptional in other classes coming up.

I’m still going to get the job done.

Fall and Rise

June 28th 2018

I was offered a job. In IT. $19/hr 28/hr overtime. By my current status, it’s considered a jackpot. It’s with a temp agency that I worked with years back. They changed the name but name dropping old supervisors got my foot in. From there, I was on boarded.

So what’s wrong? Well, though I will be called for jobs that I am qualified for, the first assignment out the gate I am NOT qualified for. Server network admin. I just don’t have enough background in that work for a big business.

Part of me felt like I should’ve lied. Said I could handle it and do as much research as possible. I know I said that I would “create“ a better resume so I can get the work I’m looking for, but I do usually stay within the framework of things I do know so I wouldn’t have to lie when I get there.

I feel, because I didn’t lie, that I was not aggressive enough.

On the other side, if I did lie and I got caught in a lie I probably would lose the job and everything.

So, taking it from that perspective, I don’t feel so bad. I’m in a holding pattern waiting for the next job but I did sign off at $19 an hour. Armed with that knowledge, I now know how much I’m worth. I’ll still look for other tech work with the same resume I gave them knowing I’m asked by for 19.00.

This experience taught me the importance of really knuckling down to get these certifications. Not just A+ either. Network +, Security +, etc.

Im being brief because I’m entering this entry from my phone from sketchy internet service. Just know I realized recently that I am not the same man I used to be anymore, and how easily I can fall back into that man when I feel defeated or depressed.

As of this day, with all I am actively doing, I am a better man and its important I drop people and things from a dead past. Any attempt to connect with even people from a self destructive past —— even if not so destructive but associative from who I was —— isn’t very healthy and forward in motion.

I sometimes seek old friends and old habits when I feel down.

Instead, I will play my guitar. Eventually get back to animation.

Practice is going okay. I’m learning to fit in finger drills at all free moments. Which means the guitar travels with me when possible.

Got all “A’s” in last units assignments.

Once I’m working officially, I’m looking into a new wardrobe also. Throwing all the old crap away.

I want everything in my life a fresh start.

Child Support

June 20th, 2018

I was married before. We have two children that are now well into their teens. I love my children; that I can’t and will never deny. They were the only best part of that relationship.

What do I remember of my marriage with that woman? Her parting words that I can’t ever forget and they keep constantly ringing through my subconscious, making me cringe with anger and hate: “I’m going to take you for child support and they’re going to take all of your money.”

Quote — end quote.

Add to her annoying high-pitch voice and you get the picture.

At the time the child support started, I was making more money. I have, of course, since lost that job and they have been adding arrears into the thousands. Honestly, I have never owed so much to one source in all my life. I have tried to reduce it when I had a lesser job. The judge flat out said: ‘No.’

Really. I couldn’t afford the payments and it was ramping up astronomically back then and he said, without reason, just No.

To this day, I think that is where I started hating people.

I have made attempts to reduce it or change things but the system is thick with red tape. I would have to go back to NY and it’s a complicated mess on purpose. The quest to be a lawyer also includes rectifying alot of this bullshit, by the way.

So what has happened ever since:

I lost my drivers license.

I can’t get a passport.

I have ‘dead-beat’ status arrears that are heavy and impossible to pay off at $12.00/hr.

A long time ago, I asked the ex to help me reduce or remove this child support order. She said no.

I think back then I was near going to kill her. Why? Because I am constantly in my children’s life REGARDLESS. I give them money directly. I even gave them debit cards that allow me to give them money they can use.

Why don’t I pay the child support directly?

Well, let’s go back about eight years ago. I had a good job that paid about $16.00 an hour. Child support started taking their payments and one day my children stayed with me as they usually did in the summer or holidays. They didn’t have appropriate coats for the weather or even decent clothing.

So I asked, “what is your mother doing with the money she’s getting?” I shouldn’t have involved them in my struggles with that bitch but I was fed up. She talks bad about me to them and I usually don’t reciprocate by calling her a bitch to them. But this time, I let my son see what got taken from my checks for child support and opened his eyes to the mother he has. Based on what he said and the lack of stuff I see them have, the money I sent wasn’t being used for them.

Then he confirmed stories I already knew about her: spending money on other people and parties to make herself look like an important person.

She has a job, but when all this started, you got to understand, she ‘took’ my children from New York (where we used to live) and moved to Albany, GA. For about two months, she tried to live off my child support payments, without telling me where she went. If I kept a journal of those events, you would have witnessed me very destroyed at the time. Basically, we divorced, she hit me with child support, when I came to pick up the kids on the weekends like I always did, she was gone. Moved. Left without telling me.

That was when I used some of my inherent missing person’s skills. I found them through a logical set of questions/asking people who didn’t want to tell me. Got a lawyer and forced her back to answer for taking my kids across state lines. The most that happened was I stopped her from moving any further without my permission. She kidnapped my children and got away with it and I’m still paying.

So, flash forward to now and I don’t want her dead as much as I used to but child support still hangs over my head. I don’t ‘willingly’ report it to the services because they often take more than I can afford to live on plus I give my money to the kids directly for the things they need and it’s never as much as they need to take.

I don’t know if that amount will ever get paid, so I don’t even bother.

Meanwhile, there are times, like now, where it catches up to me. They started taking money from this little job I have, cutting my income down to more than half. If the job wasn’t worth going to with what I got, it sure isn’t worth going for less than half.

But this is the constant rotation of it all: Find a job, child support starts in, quit the job because I can’t afford to go to the job or live off of it, find another job, repeat.

I can’t answer for other fathers not doing for their children, but I do. My kids know it and I’m deadlocked into a system that won’t reduce the arrears, release my driver’s license to get to a job if I needed it and it keeps rising. Add a bitch ex-wife that just wants “all my money” and you can see why many ex-wives end up dead.

I have no sympathy when I hear of an ex-wife murdered by her ex. You don’t know the buttons that bitch probably pushed. If you knew the buttons my ex pushed, you’d want her to die, too.

So I’m in a position where if my kids need money, I have to direct them to their mother that received a payment. How can I give them any more directly if she’s getting it?

This sends me in a frantic need to get/find a better job. But, because of my lack of a degree, I couldn’t get a better job — and this brings us to where we are today: me striving for a better life with a degree, thus a potentially better job.

Let’s be clear: if I was getting paid at a job that allowed me to have a life and pay this child support bill, I would be fine with it. I don’t WANT to pay child support to this particular whore, but I am WILLING to pay it if I can make sure I can survive too. What’s the point of paying child support if I can’t survive to go to work to earn the money? Which I will never understand why they suspend driver’s licenses. How do you get to a job without a license? Reasonably. Don’t say mass transit because fuck mass transit if you have a car.

I’m venting. I have a lot more to say on this ex-wife bitch thing but I’m trying to stay centered. The plan has not changed. In fact, I’m really just writing this as documentation to showcase the overall pressure I’m going through. To underscore exactly WHY I am pushing for this degree.

But the degree isn’t coming tomorrow. Or the next week. I have another year and ½ at best before I graduate and can utilize the degree.

So, if I wanted law, I said I was going for a paralegal certification. Get certified and get a better job, right?

But the classes for paralegal cost more than I currently make now that child support is being taken. Not that I suspected this would happen, but I am so used to things falling apart when things are going good, I prepared a contingency plan should I not be able to get the paralegal classes which is …

A+ Certification. I’m in an IT degree program BECAUSE I wanted a safety if law didn’t go through. I’m studying the A+ Certification BECAUSE I can’t afford the paralegal certification classes yet. The A+ lessons are free with my education at AIU. All I have to do is pay the exam testing fee which is like $97 each (I’ll need two of them).

Get certified and I can start looking at $16+/hr jobs. Preferably into the $20/hr jobs repairing PCs and technical support, which I have experience in. But my resume jumps from job to job so much I have to really develop one that will be the ultimate IT support specialist version that takes advantage of the certification to come and the bachelor’s degree to come.

What if I don’t get A+ certified? What if I fail the exam? I’m already tired as it is working six days at a job on my feet all night and with a small window to study.

Do I quit this job giving my ex the big “go fuck yourself’? Then I’ll be out of even that little bit of weekly money to even pay for the exam; putting more pressure on my wife again.

Honestly, I’m sticking to the plan.

The plan is working. I just have to notch back how I spend money with the little I have.

I’ll also have to drop down to five days instead of six days a week at this cornball job. A touch less money but more time to study and work on classwork.

I’ll still give a little money directly to my kids. Just not as much as before, I guess. Simply can’t afford it.

THANK GOD I bought that guitar when I said I would. Seeing the child support take a majority of my money, I would have not bought it, knowing it was a frivolous purchase. It’s actually essential. You need something to make yourself happy. I want to learn the guitar and, through all this stress of trying to make more money, get a better education, child support, etc,… I need this artistic ‘me’ time.

Keeping the child support rolling keeps the system off me indirectly. It doesn’t pay off the arrears, but it’s documented SOMETHING is being paid and that isn’t a bad thing. If .. WHEN … I get certified, I’ll look for work first within the same temp agency I currently work for. This way, the support order stays consistent and I just have to have income requirements that will satisfy both the support and myself.

Otherwise, get certified and just find another job — making the support order find me.

Heavy sigh. Regardless, nothing changes. It was a few short months ago I didn’t have a dime to my name and was unemployed.

I’m employed with less money weekly — but I have money. Now, it’s just up to me to weave through life with a saving/spending control system that won’t make me feel broke until I get the certification. For instance, if I need to pay for things like the exam that’s $97, I don’t use the whole check for the exam fee. I save $50 this week. $50 next week. I split all bills I need to pay in half and storage cash when I can.

The bitch did not win. I am not as angry and I’m still doing well in school, going to learn the guitar, going to get certified and currently happily married.

I just have to stay on track and keep telling myself: the bitch did not win.

I’m winning.

Deep Thoughts

June 16th, 2018

Yesterday, I helped someone who’s car battery was dead. I had the wires to help jump his car and I was happy to do it. I’m often available to help people, oddly enough. As much as I can’t stand people, I haven’t turned from someone in need. It’s “working with” people that sucks ass.

But my misanthropic views of asshole people isn’t the topic of the day. I thought I would record something I always knew about life and where we stood in it. Some of these thoughts are clear in the progress of this entire journal: our life’s purpose and the things we WANT and LOVE aren’t always the things we are MEANT to DO and BE. I love writing and filmmaking. I struggled to be a writer and filmmaker. I hate the educational system and law. All of that is flowing easily for me. Almost serendipitously. Therefore, I am a round peg fit into a round slot that I have mentally and physically fought for years against. Film and writing was the wrong slot, though I still want it.

You’ve heard me comment on this throughout the journal and nothing has changed to prove me wrong. You can keep doing what you love, and if you are being hammered at every turn to make it work, and still keep hammering and nothing is working — people tend to keep saying “keep trying. Never give up”, while nothing still seems to make it work —- thats a problem.

Then, of course, you have people who fit perfectly: they love what they do, it all comes easy, and opportunities flow into their lap without any effort even though it will be said they “worked hard”. No, the man fighting uphill to get his dreams is working hard. Against the grain of what he or she was slotted for and still not winning.

In a nutshell: there is a purpose for the life you have. Something you are supposed to do and be — do those things and universal order will put it in your path to make sure you obtain it. Guaranteed.

Now, added to that is WHERE you are supposed to be. This totally goes against my rejection of people, but I’ve come to this conclusion before each time I help someone. It’s a mindbending examination of what you’re supposed to be doing, where you are supposed to be and time.

An example: You wake up, get ready for work, eat breakfast, drive to work, get into the office, sit, do whatever work you’re supposed to do, get up to go to lunch, cross the street to the cafe, sit at the cafe, eat your food, throw out your garbage, hold the door for someone on your way out, cross the street to go to work and a car smashes into the front of your building jumping the curve, hitting three people. In your mind, anyone of those people could have been you if you did any one of these things:

Woke up earlier.
Ate breakfast earlier.
Got to work earlier
Ate lunch earlier
Crossed the street earlier

You avoided getting killed because of a set sequence of time that you had no control of. Sped up your steps at any time could have connected that accident with you.

So, you’re saying I’m crazy and it’s a random event and you’re just blessed to not have been in that accident.

I ask you this: so, the people that got killed “weren’t blessed?”

I’m ‘enough’ of a Christian to believe in blessings, but I also like to tear down the logic of things. The example above has multiple timing events that go without saying:

The driver that hit the people could have been a senior that lost control of the car. What was his schedule and life’s events that led up to this? How many warnings was he or she given that could have prevented this? How many warnings did he or she ignore?

The people that got hit also had schedules of time they were on. Individual things that slowed down or sped up where they had to or wanted to be.

With all those factors at play, we just throw our hands up to call things random because we don’t want to think it through. What? Am I saying we can foresee our future to avoid tragedy?

No. Not at all.

But, we all have a voice that speaks to us. Some stronger than others, that aligns us with the path we should be going. Take a drug user. He wakes up and needs to go see a drug pusher for his daily fix. I am certain, there is a voice speaking to him in his consciousness that is telling him — or making him feel — “I shouldn’t go out this day” (if not anymore). The free will of us and desire to get that ‘drug’ overpowers that voice and he goes to the drug den where he gets shot and killed. He wasn’t supposed to be there. He could have avoided it.

My example above would have to assume each person had a voice they listened to, but suffice to say, they didn’t listen to except for the main person in the example.

Aside from hunger, the voice in the example could have been the person waking up and getting out of bed on time — urging him to get going and not be late. For no other reason than to be diligent as opposed to other days where he or she is slacking — dragging to get to work. Today, he or she is urged to keep it moving. At work, do his or her job and the urge to eat ‘at this time’. Not later. Not earlier. Right now. Don’t stop, keep moving to the next thing. Eat, throw out your garbage. Don’t hurry. Don’t waste time. Cross the street… and he/she misses the accident.

For the others that did get hit: their voices could have urged them to keep a schedule and they denied it. They dragged their heels. They hurried when they should have slowed down. They all caught up with a time and a place that connected with a senior citizen that was told by others and his/her own conscience to stop driving because you’re too old. The senior citizen ignored it and thus consequences.

Do I believe we are slotted to die, as in, those three people were MEANT to die at that place in that fashion? That appointed time, those three were to be where they had to be so they can get hit by a car? Here’s where logic continues to play itself out by asking another question:

Are we born just to die violently?

I don’t think so.

Could we be born to die by cancer or any of the millions of diseases? Like a baby born today and dies a month later from something out of our control?

It happens and ‘why’ is a hard answer to reach. So we back up time again: were the parents SUPPOSED to have children? Were there voices at play that said ‘we shouldn’t”. Were there countless attempts to have a child, and it never happened — then they kept trying and finally had one — then later that child dies (disease, accident, any age)? Looking at life that closely makes you start questioning was the child SUPPOSED to exist in the first place.

Something you can’t answer. But based on my theories, if there is a struggle to have a child and you have one, then the child dies at some point early— based on my theory, there is no foundation that supports the existence of the child. No plotted ground for them to really keep moving forward. They live, do things they think they want to do or be, and then, out of step for a universally planned future to be someone, do something or connect with others — they die young, or die old unfulfilled.

Then you have people that give birth to a child out of wedlock, or by rape — then they go on to be world leaders or scientists. By choice or slotted by life to ‘be’?

Going back to this guy I helped: I had a good feeling to get out of the house, go to the store for my wife and was hungry right at that time. With a few choices to make, I felt I should go to the Waffle House, park the car with intentions of ordering my food, crossing the street and going to the store for my wife.

As I parked the car at Waffle House, I met a young kid that needed his battery jumped.

He must have been out there for a little bit. No one was able (or wanted to) help him. But I happened to have my charger cables and helped him out.

A lot of events led up to me having the charger cables in the car — that could conceivably lead up to this day to help this young man onto whatever purpose he had. But that’s a long and extra trip. Suffice to say, I had battery issues with this car for the longest and swore never to drive without cables again.

But today, I was up, out of the house and had to be somewhere — comfortably. Not a rush. Just instinctively had to keep it moving and that’s when I came to help this young man. Any other day, I would NEVER be at the Waffle House.

Coincidence? Random meeting? It’s easier on our brains to think that.

And to just sum it up as “I was supposed to be there” isn’t enough either.

The connectivity to the consciousness we hear — that little voice — the urges we get to adjust to time and space to be ‘where we are supposed to be’ cumulates depending on what we ignore, who we are and what we are doing. I think it even extends to what we are supposed to or not supposed to eat as well.

I know, it’s a lot of thinking this morning. But If I’m right, I don’t really think the term “it was his time to go” is how this thing called life and death works. I’m beginning to believe we have the ability to live a very long time — provided we listen to how to live. From my example above, it wasn’t that it was their time to die in that accident, it’s more like “they did not have to be involved in that accident if they listened to —-” what? A bio-alarm system? A bio-time adjustment recommendation?

Or were they part of the born pointlessly and could die any day theory? No, that sounds too cruel.

Way too many variables so I have to stick with the guarantees: we have a voice/feeling that adjusts us to where we should be in time and space should we choose to listen to it. Helps us adjust to WHO and WHAT we should be in life as well. I rejected that voice on my desire to be a filmmaker when I got hints of law through many aspects of my life. Not just now. I listened to that urging to get out of the house yesterday and was there for that young man.

It’s just a matter of working that conscience muscle further.