Help for a school competition

[debux]

Hello dudes!

I'm going to be asking you for some help here... one of the main reasons of why I'm not so active is because I recently took the responsibilities of being the leader/king of an alliance/(Prussia, in this case) at my school, in part due tu my desire to do something noteworthy and useful in my last school year (it's actually the first time I do something for a bigger group than only my class). So I hope that can explain a bit of why I'm not spamming as much as in my good ol' golden days.

The thing is that we have are competing with the two other teams/allainces in doing a list of missions we have to complete in a few weeks. On of the chores is to get a facebook page of our alliance to 1500 likes. Yes, yes, I can already hear your grumbles of dissent already. I hate being the annoying dude that promotes facebook stuff, but I'm kind of desperate to get these likes (I believe in the concept of "lead by example", so I hope that the things that I do will be followed by my prussian subjects ). So, if it's not too much trouble, can you please like our page?

I'd really like to thank you in advance. It's a tremendous help if you help us out here.

And if you're curious about how my life has changed, in the greater part due to this, feel free to ask

Cheerios!
-debux

[Cuddly Khan]

Anything to help our buddy!

[debux]

Thanks mate!

[Jubal]

Done. 

[comrade_general]

How has your life changed?

[Phoenixguard09]

Absolutely mate,

Oh and seconding CG's question there. ^

[debux]

Thanks mates Oh yeah, and on life changes... jesus, I knew I should have not logged on to Exilian so late. So I'll just write it all tomorrow, otherwise I'll just write bullarmadillo here (AN IN HURRIBUL GRAMER TU).

[Othko97]

Done 

[debux]

Big thanks!

Alrighty-o! I'll just take time off from studying to write this down. It's gonna be rather long, so I thought I might as well write it down in chapters or something. Man, I hate writing, my thoughts go so much faster than my hands and I tend to forget all the stuff I think before I get to write!

Well, when did it start? I guess it might have started before my exchange to Germany last year, around November. I used to be the guy that was very critical to society, always had my arms crossed at anything I didn't like and never ever made an attempt to change it myself (as a matter of fact, I discovered I kind of feared responsabilities, to having to commit to something, such as changing something or making an entirely new thing). Well, going to Germany allowed me to get into a whole new environment (Jesus Christ, if you guys think that Germans are cold, you guys have no idea how cold those goddamned Germans are from a spicing hot sausy brown latino's point of view  ). I knew from before that I wanted to take advantage of this whole change of enviroment to make a change in myself, resolving to "cure" my shyness issues. But man, you really have to fight for friendships there... I really had to try my best at trying to get people I could trust on, and be trusted on. This same thing made me switch "(social) groups" a lot (germans tend to get together in groups of 3-10 buddies, and pretty much only do stuff among each other), as I tried to find people that were similar to the guys I had as friends back in Chile.  However, in this lengthy process, I noticed I wasn't shy at all. I had wanted to be shy all my life. I had convinced myself my whole life I was shy, being horrible at making new friendships. But no! I proved myself completely wrong, and this whole new discovery actually made me be quite happy.

Back to Chile
Yaaaaaay. It's hard to tell if I'd ever wanted to leave. So many liberties, so many good things (holy flying spaghetti monster, all the SWEETS they had! It's amazing!) and the stuff works there! I mean, people are very respectful for each other (generally, something that is barely a wish here in South America), allowing stuff to work as it should, as everybody fulfills their job well, so that other people can do their jobs without major problems, and so and so forth. But I really missed the close relationships you form here (I never thought I'd miss the physical affection we Latinos are kind of famous for, i used to loathe it before going to Germany), plus all my friends and living a normal life. However, coming back to the normal life meant going back to normal school (in Germany we had to go to school too, but we never got graded, so we could do whatever we wanted), which meant finishing the IB. I guess some of you have noticed that I've progressively lost more and more time, mostly because each time the IB was giving us more and more assignments. As a matter of fact, it was so stressful at one point that 4 girls of our class (of 15) decided to quit the IB because they all got diagnosed depression, or simply didn't have the motivation anymore to finish (yeah, it was some serious armadillo). I was decided to finish the IB (after all, I got so far, and to simply throw it away for nothing? Nu-uh), so I told myself at the start of the year that I'd do my best effort in the last 2 months before the exams started. I didn't count on myself to stumble on the way though.

The downfall
I mentally arranged myself a schedule of what I was going to study for the following weeks, plus finishing all the papers I had left undone before going to Germany (okay, yeah, sure, I was just fed up and simply wanted to leave, have a few months vacation, alright? ). It all fit perfectly and I'd even have a lot of free time to be able to relax doing other stuff (*cough* RTW). In paper. Reality is so much more different. Everyday, right after school, I'd come home, log into the PC thinking I had the willpower to stay for one hour or so, just check the vital stuff, and then get to study. Instead, I would find myself still on the PC until 12 PM (weekdays, weekends were much worse), and ended the day without a armadillo done. I hated myself. I was incapable of even even fulfilling the simplest of achievements, considering I was going to write the most important exams until now, what I had studied for and my parents had paid for 2 years and I spent whole afternoons on the PC watching portugaling commentaries on YT. That, coupled with my existentialist thoughts on the world ("Why are we here?" and it's similars wrecked my brain consistently during that whole period) made me feel horrible. I'd come home with the watery eyes I had had during the whole day at school, only to distract myself being at the computer and forgetting what I was so depressed at. I felt being a leftover from humanity, being the irresponsible, sensitive little portugaler that couldn't do one portugaling homework, having the whole afternoon for myself. Life was good. For others, but not for me.

The epiphany
I had been close to a month of this bloody behavior. I was one freaking week away from exams, did a tenth of all the armadillo I said at the start of the semester I was going to do, and with no real possible escape. And of course, I held it all for myself, showing my best of my hypocritical character to show the most sociable and happy face to the outside world, when I could feel like armadillo underneath. I'm glad today that no-one really knew what kind of hell went through my mind at that time, because there was some sick armadillo floating around there.

Then it happened.

I did, most probably, the most mature thing I ever did, I could have done, and ever possibly will do. I decided to face it. Stop your portugaling crying, stop hiding behind your precious PC screen. Sit down, figure out what makes you feel bad, and find solutions to that. It's the first real time I ever was so determined to do such a big move. I always lacked the push one needs to start a project, yet somehow, in my worst minute, I unconsciously summoned the energy to do so. It was the sunny 9th of May, I came home with the usual watery eyes and my body completely sore after intensive sport-playing earlier, and I sat down in my room with a notebook in hand. And wrote. I think I've never written stuff that was so locked up inside me. If I usually didn't openly express the stuff I felt, there was even a smaller chance I'd ever write it down. I spent a whole hour, figuring out what troubled me, what didn't allow me to live as a normal, happy person. And found the solutions to it.

I'm so glad I went to Germany. It was the stepping stone to this. If it allowed me to prove myself that I had convinced myself my entire life I was shy, this revelation made me see I had invented almost everything about me. My irresponsibility, my lack at proactivity and to do stuff when they should be done, and my low self-esteem (although that's an entirely different matter ) were all things I had chosen to flee from whenever they challenged me. I always gave up at the smallest sign of having to assume greater responsibilities, and simply chose to say "no" to any opportunity to do something different in my life, just because it meant breaking the mold of my usual habits, and having to assume responsibilities. My friends usually teased me because of this, that I always said "no" to new stuff, stuff that had no knowledge of before, or it meant experiencing something completely new, but I never realized how right they were, and how wrong I was.

I made myself a promise. I'd always remember that day, and remember the fundamentals I had figured out to keep me strong, and forget all what had troubled me before. I never wanted to fall back into that hole again, so I sealed it, both materially (a wristband) and spiritually (I did probably the thing I hated myself about the most, a combination of my three main problems I mentioned before, like self-esteem. It was to tell the girl I have liked my entire life the truth of my behaviour to her, as a challenge to myself, and because I felt she deserved to know the truth of why my behaviour had always been so erratic).

The aftermath
Things are good. I'm happy. It seems to be visible. After the exams (oh yeah, I almost forgot to mention them, in the end I answered what I could, but I'm not worried about the results: I'm happy of what I learned from myself in the process), my personal german teacher, who hadn't seen me in almost 6 months, told me that I looked quite a deal happier, even though I had a cold that day and wasn't feeling that great. It was such a morale boost. I myself felt happier, but it's even better to hear such stuff from other people (plus, she's really honest, and only makes such remarks when it's really evident and true). Besides, I don't know if other people can look into me and see the change I've done, or maybe that I look physically better after germany, but I seem to be looked at more often by girls, which is always welcome  .

Part of my promise was to change stuff about me. Change nasty habits I had, like saying "no" to everything. I got my chance to prove myself, when I was informed that our alliance needed leaders (or kings, in this case, as the alliances represents old kingdoms of Germany). As a matter of fact, I instinctively denied wanting to be the King (with the typical excuse of "uuuhmm, nah, maybe i could be interested, but I don't know" and then just walk away), but then I rethought it, remembered my whole promise, and decided to risk it. Turns out I'm now the King of Prussia, and although it's exhausting trying to manage a group of 120 people who barely do armadillo for the alliance (the smallest ones, who have a heckload more time than we do, do nothing! NOTHING!), it really feels good to prove myself than I do have leader capabilities (something I had always doubted I had), than I am even capable of firing up or quieting down crowds (if you count our 120 member alliance as a crowd ). It's even hilarious to see the smaller ones addressing me really formally, when I just want them to feel in comfort with me (I just laugh with my buddies after hearing them, it's just it's so funny!).

That brings me to the last point. This whole change made me change my whole point of thinking. When it was always denial before, my answer to most things is "why not?". Why not try to do myself, and try to improve it? Why not try something new? Why not try?. It's just a simple change of attitude (oh, and also just ignore those close minded dudes that have that denial approach to everything ), but it has opened such a broad world of opportunities, or really trying to "seize the day" (although it's not always, but I'm trying to improve on that). It's just a change to be open to anything, accept it, and if possible, try to improve it. It's exhausting, yeah, but it makes me feel good with myself, just to think I tried.

Edit.: Did I just write that much? Is it really 1 hour and a half later after I started! Holy armadillo, it's 12:30 and I haven't had dinner!

Oh, and if you really were able to read all that, big cookie for you. It's a huge load of mental BS that floats around my head that you were able to handle

[comrade_general]

Holy shart. I'm going to have to wait till after work to read this.

[Phoenixguard09]

Well done Debux. I'm very proud of you mate.

Brave man. What other stuff are you doing with regards to this alliance?

[comrade_general]

OK, just read it all, and after so many words I have none of my own to share. All I can do is agree with PG.

[debux]

Holy cow! It's like I scrolled again through my huge-ass text and laughed, aside of feeling a bit busy... sorry that it was so long, but it was quite a bit of what I had to say... actually, I think about stuff quite a bit, but I tend to forget (I should open a thread here on my daily thought, in part to share, and also so that I don't forget)

Right now, we have to complete a list of 98 missions, due next friday (we only have one week left to complete the circa. 60 missions we're missing!). I've been pressuring people a lot lately to get it done, which kind of explains my temporal absence... thank god this weekend has one day extra, and that class ends next week

EDIT: Thanks for reading, BTW! I know it must have been quite eye-straining, but it means quite a bit that you gave yourselves time to read it