i haven’t been feeling well for the last few days and it has had some positive and negative effects on my body.

first the positive. my throat has been sore for the last few days which is aggravated by drinking, swallowing or smoking. this has caused me not to smoke for the past three days. no matter how bad the urge i have to smoke the pain it causes my throat outweighs the urge to smoke. i’m hoping that once my throat becomes better my desire to smoke will be completely gone.

sleeping habits. because i haven’t been feeling well i’ve actually been able to get to bed at a reasonable hour. by midnight i’m in bed and i’m able to sleep.

sadly the sleep isn’t a refreshing one. the past few days – the past few days i’ve been able to get to bed at a reasonable hour – i’ve been having these weird dreams which last about five minutes at which point i wake up and then turn my whole body. i know it’s about five minutes in length because i’m fully awake when i wake up and i have about 20 seconds of consciousness before i fall back asleep and i look at the clock to see that only 5-7 minutes has passed. these 5 minute block of sleep is filled with dreams or rather 1 dream. it’s a vivid dream like a short story with a start middle and end. at the end of the dream i wake up. feel uneasy and then i toss and turn in the hopes of getting comfortable then repeat. this goes on the whole night then into the morning and i don’t feel rested.

it was no different today. i basically had short story dreams all night. i know because i kept tossing and turning and looked at the clock at random moments to find the passage of time in 5 min increments. each dream was so vivid and moving. and in those 20 seconds in between dreams i told myself i should remember these sad but true stories. but like all dreams they fade by the time i finally decided to get up for the day. i read somewhere that you only remember nightmares and that all the dreams you’ve forgotten are good dreams. i hope they all were good dreams.

so today i was over at a friend’s place to play poker and watch the super bowl. as i sat there watching the super bowl i started to remember… one year ago we were moving into our new apartment. we didn’t have cable in the apartment but we had internet – so i tried to find a website which showed the super bowl game. i finally found a site which played the game but it didn’t have commentary and no audio. it was a European site which didn’t show any commercials, just the actual game. i remember we had it on the background as we were unpacking. finally after a bit we decided to go downstairs to the bar to watch the game and grab dinner. we were unpacking into our new apartment. we were still together doing the most common of things.

i miss her so much. everything still reminds me of her.

feeling like crap… been feeling like crap for a few days now. sore throat and sore body. starting to sweat as well. i feel like i’m at the beginnings of a cold or something. i’ve been drinking nothing but hot tea and staying in hoping i’ll feel better soon.

so i had a dream this morning… it was a good dream but i woke up right at the moment… well, let me explain. in my dream i was back at my parent’s place in my old bedroom. i was lying in bed talking on the phone with a guy. i was telling him my personal philosophy in life and the like and i felt that i was talking too much – so i was trying to get the point across without sounding long winded. then when i turned around i say a delivery lady with a small bouquet of flowers and a letter. the letter was a few loose pages of paper bent so that the two ends touched each other. the ends had a seal on it to keep the contents hidden. the pages were not folded so that the page looked like a loop.

i remember in my dream my heart skipped a beat. i took the flowers and the letter and then signed for them. the thoughts running through my mind was that this was for Valentines Day and that Vineesha sent them. i was fumbling with the seal on the letter to confirm it was from her and more importantly to read what she had to say. i was in a state of panic to find out… as i fumbled with the letter… i woke up…

it’s 3:50 am and of course i’m up. i wonder if it’s my internal clock that’s messed up or if it’s because my mind is uneasy. i am at unease… but additionally i haven’t been sleeping until around 6-7am every night / morning. i have tried to adjust my sleeping habits but i just can’t fall asleep. when i try to lay in bed, instead of getting tired my mind wonders. my heart becomes uneasy.

so instead i’m up trying to occupy my mind with movies, videos, manga, games, etc… but they are all minor distractions. my mind wanders.

i looked at Vineesha’s pictures again. the same thought runs through my mind every time i do this. i was engaged to her. i wonder what she’s doing. i want to talk to her. then i quickly close the pictures and try to push these thoughts from my mind. i have to leave her alone. i have to respect her wishes.

another random thought. when i tried to remind Vineesha that we were soul mates she stated that she no longer believed this. she told me that during the month apart she had given this a lot of thought and decided that she no longer believed in a single soul mate. rather she believed that people are connected to lots of people. that it takes lots of connections. she gave her mom as an example. how her mother was her best friend and a support. then she named Reena, her best friend in California as another example. she stated that she believed there isn’t a single person but rather a group of people you are connected to.

i’ve been thinking of this. i think she is right. i’m also thinking that it was this reason that i was so sad in Cleveland. i had turned to her to make me happy. to be my everything. without my connections to my family, my friends and my familiar places in Seattle i felt lost. i wanted Vineesha to fill these holes in me.

now that i’m back in Seattle i have my friends, my family and all the things that Seattle has to offer closer to me. am i happy with having all of these things back. no. i am not. because even though i have all these connections again i’m still missing one connection i want most. the connection i had to Vineesha. i wonder if she is happy now. to be able to have a connection with her family, her friends and her new life without being tied down to me. but i also wonder… is she missing the connection to me as i miss the connection to her. is she complete without me.

it’s 4 am in the morning… and of course i’m still up. the current craziness floating in my mind. the notion of change. Vineesha loved me once. perhaps she loves me still – but she was in love with me. then something changed. she no longer wanted to be with me.

the last time i spoke to her was a month after i moved back to Seattle. i was sure that she would reach out to me. when she didn’t i started to panic. i started to think – who cares who reaches out to who. i just wanted to be with her. so i called her. tried to call her i should say. what i wasn’t aware of at the time was that she was on call that night and didn’t call back. in a panic i booked a flight to Cleveland that evening for the following morning. i landed and drove to the house we once shared.

when i spoke to her that night she was a different person. she was a person i’ve never seen before. she was polite but distant. familiar yet cold. she made it very clear that she didn’t want anything to do with me. yet i remember one aspect of the conversation we had.

she mentioned that it was hard for her the first month. that she missed me a lot. but then as time passed by she came to the conclusion that she didn’t want anything to do with me. at the time all i could think about was how i was a fool not to reach out to her sooner. considering i was thinking of her everyday. i still do.

these are my current thoughts. if she missed me the first month. then changed her mind. could she change her mind again? or did all this time just solidify her decision. to be completely honest i’m thinking that she hasn’t changed her mind and that all this time has just confirmed her decision. but that’s not what i’m thinking of. i’m thinking of this. can her mind be changed again? can she fall in love with me again? can her mind be changed to want me. to want me as a part of her life.

there is a tiny voice behind the back of my mind telling me that i’m just torturing myself with these silly thoughts. but there is another voice that wonders. is it possible? change is a constant. can she not change again?

so the first month of 2010 is done. how close am i to reaching my goal of becoming self-sufficient only with passive income? not very. here’s a quick recap of projects.

fun fun animals :
the iphone / ipod touch app geared towards parents who are bi-lingual is not doing very well. it’s an app which has 20 animals with multiple languages. it allows the user to change the language and the language chosen displays with the animal illustration. you can also record your own voice so that the kids will learn from hearing your own voice saying the animal name. unfortunately it isn’t taking off as i had hoped. so far i’ve sold 7 copies of that app at $.99. given that apple takes 30% and then i split the profits with the developer that totals to $2.45 of passive income for Jan of 2010.

gin rummy :
an iphone / ipod touch app created for a client. i have a 5 year deal with the client to receive 25% of all sales to be paid out every three months. i received my first royalty check in Dec of 2009. the royalty check came to around $900. sadly this app is doing better then the app i created for myself.

vizpowered :
a webhosting company i started over a year ago with a developer. the idea was to sign up small businesses for hosting and charge them $20/month. we currently have 3 paying customers. after the cost of paying our hosting company we have about $40 in profits per month. divide that by two and that leaves about $20 in profit per month in passive income for me.

happy hour invite :
another iphone / ipod touch app that’s been done design wise for over 8 months. it’s been in development for some time. i had to fire the first developer because he couldn’t deliver on his promises. i ended up hiring two developer friends who offered to develop the app + website for free! which is great except that they both have full time jobs. one has a wife which means he really doesn’t have a lot of time to dedicate to the project. i’m hoping they will make some head way in development this month. i’m going to be meeting them mid month this month to discuss progress and next steps. this is the app + website i’m hoping will allow me to achieve my goal of becoming self-sufficient only on passive income. the hope is to have free listings and premium listings. the premium listings will be subscription based at $30/ month. if i can sign up 150 premium listings that will total to $4,500 / month in passive income which will allow me to reach my goal.

my worries for this app + website is this.

01. there are already a lot of happy hour apps in the apple store. when i first conceived of this idea there were only 6 and only 2 were half decent and they only covered two cities. now there are over a dozen and a few are nation wide.

02. exposure. i had hoped that because there wasn’t too many nation wide happy hour apps i would have a fairly easy time getting people to download this free app. but now with more apps + some of them offering nation wide coverage i’m starting to worry about exposure. will people download yet another free happy hour app?

03. exposure. seeing the lack of popularity of my first app (fun fun animals) i’m starting to worry about getting users to download and use happy hour invites. the whole thing rests of users. if i can get enough users using the app then i can go to various businesses with these numbers to convince them they should sign up for a premium listing. if nobody is using the app then it will be a hard sell to convince businesses that they should convert to a premium listing.

summary :
so in summary the amount of passive income generated by various projects per month comes to about $325 / month

goal :
my goal to achieve self-sufficiency in passive income in my estimates is around $4,000 / month. i’m short by $3,675. that’s quite a bit to make up in 11 months.

next steps :
the next steps as i see it are as follows. i need to do more promotion of fun fun animals. start design on fun fun foods – another app geared towards kids. this time it’s geared towards 4 year olds. i’m thinking that perhaps i should take a different approach with this one by having default audio saying all the different food items. keep at the developers to finish the happy hour invite app. keep getting additional freelance jobs so that i can maintain my costs until the end of 2010.

as time passes your purpose in life changes. at least for some. this purpose can be a goal or something you’re forced to do. for example. when you were young the purpose in life was to go to school, do your chores, watch cartoons, play outside. you get the idea. as you got older it was to get a part time job, ask out that girl, get into college.

as you get older you start to achieve some of the purposes you’ve set for yourself. others – you don’t really think about. it’s there but you think – i’ll get to them. i’ve got plenty of time.

when i was in my 20’s i thought that by the time i’m 30 i will be married with kids living in a house. i actually believed this because 30 was so far away. i also believed that after i graduated from college i would move to San Francisco to join a design firm, then to NYC then to Europe to become a famous graphic designer. funny how things change. but funny how things also happen. although these were my dreams i also had my goals – or purposes if you will.

when i was in high school i was still searching for my purpose. i didn’t know what i wanted to do. i applied to just one college which made my parents worry because… well… i was a bit of a problem child when i was in high school. but amazingly i got into the college i applied to. then i met a friend of mine who was attending the University of Washington and he told me about a program there called ‘Visual Communication.’

up til that point i really didn’t know what i wanted to do. actually that’s not true. i wanted to be a cartoonist. i wanted to draw comics. but my parents forbid me from pursuing it. i basically drew only to pay for some of my college expenses by drawing for the college paper. but Visual Communication seemed like the perfect compromise. it’s design / artistic but still a career which will ease my parent’s worries.

when i transferred to UW my purpose was to get into the Visual Communication program. after i got in i wanted to become the best in the class. i wouldn’t say i was the best… but i did become one of the top students for my class.

after i graduated i wanted to learn. i moved from one company to the next trying to learn as much as possible. i’m at a point now where for the past 3 jobs i had they were given to me without a portfolio or interview. if i had an interview they were more for show then anything else. i have been self-employed and able to get work purely from word-of-mouth for the past 3 years. so you can say that i have achieved some sense of accomplishment in my field.

but now what. what is my purpose now. i can tell you if you had asked me this same question a year ago. i could’ve told you in a heart beat. my purpose in life was to marry Vineesha and be happy. but now what. i feel lost right now.

i don’t know what my purpose in life right now is.

professional life : i really don’t have a goal which drives me. i know that i’ve set a goal for myself of achieving enough passive income to cover all expenses by the end of 2010, but that doesn’t seem like my purpose. it’s something i’ve set for myself in the hopes of creating a spark for design again.

love life : with my previous purpose of marrying Vineesha and being happy being gone i really don’t know what my purpose is. as of now i would say getting over Vineesha… but i don’t know if i can or want to.

other interests : i really don’t have anything. i don’t have hobbies, i don’t have interests. i don’t have anything which could or would be considered a spark or hint as to what my purpose is or could be.

i feel right now i’m just existing. i do the minimal amount of work to survive. it earns me enough to pay my monthly bills. it doesn’t allow for any savings. and the sad bit is… i’m okay with this. i have no desires to do anything. i don’t feel as if i have a purpose in life. i’m just living life. letting the days pass by with indifference of the passing of time. yet i feel the pangs of time becoming shorter. i’m 34 years old – 35 by July of this year. what do i have to show for it. what do i want to do. what is my purpose in life.

i don’t know why but tonight i’ve been very anxious. for some odd reason i feel that i’m losing her which sounds like an odd thing to say. it’s been over seven months… but for some odd reason today or rather tonight i feel like i’m losing her. does that even make sense?

this is what i feel like… for some odd reason i feel that i’m losing her. that with each passing day she’s moving on. that with each passing day my chances of ever recapturing what we once had is slipping away.

i know this makes no sense. i know that she has moved on. but i can’t seem to shake this anxiety. i feel that my last chance is slipping by. that if i don’t act now it’s truly over. i don’t know why i feel this way. it doesn’t make sense.