I had tasted cake and there was no going back. My tiny body had morphed into a writhing mass of pure tenacity encased in a layer of desperation. I would eat all of the cake or I would evaporate from the sheer power of my desire to eat it.

Procrastination has become its own solution – a tool I can use to push myself so close to disaster that I become terrified and flee toward success. A more troubling matter is the day-to-day activities that don’t have massive consequences when I neglect to do them.

I’d try to explain that it’s not really negativity or sadness anymore, it’s more just this detached, meaningless fog where you can’t feel anything about anything – even the things you love, even fun things – and you’re horribly bored and lonely.

I've gotten pretty good at making myself feel ashamed. I can even use shame in a theoretical sense to make myself do the right thing BEFORE I do the wrong thing. This skill could be described as "morality," but I prefer to call it "How Horrible Can I Be Before I Experience a Prohibitive Amount of Shame?

One of the most terrifying things that has ever happened to me was watching myself over and over again--thirty-five days in a row--not to return a movie I had rented. Every day, I saw it sitting there on the arm of my couch. And every day, I thought, "I should really do something about that..." and then I just didn't.

Cake is the only thing that matters.

I don't like when I can't control what reality is doing. Which is unfortunate because reality works independently of the things I want, and I have only a limited number of ways to influence it, none of which are guaranteed to work. I still want to keep tabs on reality, though. Just in case it tries to do anything sneaky. It makes me feel like I'm contributing. The illusion of control makes the helplessness seem more palatable. And when that illusion is taken away, I panic.

If you can't win, start playing a different game and score just as many points.

Fear and shame are the backbone of my self-control. They are the source of inspiration, my insurance against becoming entirely unacceptable. They help me do the right thing. And I am terrified of what I would be without them. Because I suspect that, left to my own devices, I would completely lose control of my life.

-to me, the future doesn't seem real. It's just this magical place where I can put my responsibilities so that I don't have to be scared while hurtling toward failure at right hundred miles per hour.