In 2022, I Discovered I’m (Not) Enough

My numb and sensitive emotional reactions to my mom's cancer, being laid off and failing at romance.

Me, my cousins, and my now-dead grandma and grandpa

January: I feel enough

An old business partner tells me he needs someone to take over projects he doesn't have the time to handle. I listen to what he needs help with and calculate I can finish each contract in 12 hours. Knowing I'll burn out because I'm already working full-time, I accept.

My plans to move to Mexico City for a month played a significant role. My salary could cover necessary and trivial expenses. But I knew I could buy even more unnecessary stuff if I took on three monthly projects, each paying 80% of what I earned working full-time. Renting an overpriced AirBnB and supporting Mexico City's gentrification fell into the "trivial" category. So I did that.

I feel enough.

February: I feel enough

I spend half of February in Mexico City. Most of the time, I meet San Francisco dropouts, hippie locals, and Russians who invite me to party in Guadalajara. 

A portion of the time is devoted to dating or trying to. I decided I was ready to get into a relationship on New Year's Eve. So, before arriving in Mexico City, an attractive female friend took me some pictures for a dating app. Two other female friends rate them. I upload the ones where I look the most attractive, and they get me on some dates, which, while entertaining, don't lead to anything meaningful. 

Still, I feel enough.

March: I feel kind of enough

I decide to fall in love with a girl I met three days before leaving for Mexico. It's a decision because love is a set of acts, and I pick her to be the recipient of those acts. So I flew from Mexico City to Bogotá, where she is, and not to Cartagena, where I was supposed to go. 

She didn't feel the same, and while hangs out with me, she does not see me as a potential partner. 

I'm confident in my appearance, intelligence, and financial status. So I feel enough. But I can't, for some reason, get her to like me like I want her to.

So I feel kind of enough.

April: I don't feel enough

My mom gets metastatic lung cancer. I'm shocked. But I don't cry, which displeases me. Because I remembered how I also couldn't cry when my grandma died, even after I forced myself to recall the joyful moments I had lived with her.

Frustration kicks in. I'm irritated because my conservative father raised me not to express my emotions. After all, only gay men did, he said. Then I'm disappointed in myself. I feel more accomplished than most people of my age. I'm also intelligent and know the cause of the behavior I want to change. Yet, even at 23 years old, close to 24, the way my parents raised me still makes it uncomfortable for me to tell them, "I love you," for the first time. If I can't do this, then perhaps I'm not perfect. 

Now I'm not even thinking about my mom anymore.

Perhaps because I'm not enough.

May: I don't feel enough

I don't move to Lisbon as I'd been planning since 2021. Instead, I stay close to Cartagena, where my mom lives. But I don't move back with my parents. Part of it concerns the fact that I don't like its weather, lack of plans, and absence of easily-findable like-minded people. The other reason is that if I moved to Cartagena, I couldn't keep dating the girl I like that does not like me the way I like her. She lives in Bogotá. 

I feel guilty after thinking a good son would have traveled to where his ill mother was. I climb up the guilt ladder once I remember the scientific literature about how sick people are more likely to heal or feel less pain if they are around people they love. Then, a few moments later, I reach the top of the ladder after realizing I was prioritizing a girl I met a few months ago over my mom.

I don't feel enough.

June: I feel enough

I move with the girl I'm dating to Bogotá for two weeks. We are not boyfriend and girlfriend, but I feel she loves me. It's the tenth time I've had this hunch, but this time is for real. I hope so.

I'm experiencing more positive emotions than usual, which helps me keep experiencing them. I no longer feel disheartened at my day job. I go out more often with friends. And I dedicate more time to activities I enjoy, such as writing this newsletter. 

I feel enough.

July: I feel kind of enough

The girl I'm dating stays with me at my parents' house in Cartagena. 

We only date ourselves and spend 99% of our time together. But we are not boyfriend and girlfriend. Or at least we don't call each other that way. 

I accept this situation. Part of it is because not accepting it would have meant I prioritized a girl who never loved me over my mom, who always has. So often, the thought of whether I'm acting regular in-love dumb or dumb-dumb crosses my mind. 

My mom is still on her first round of chemo, I think. Maybe her second. She's sometimes well. She's sometimes not. I buy some of her medicines, help around the house, and occasionally leave my room to talk to her. But I still can't bring myself to tell her I love her, I'm there for her, or anything emotional. So, even though I moved with her, I still feel like a bad son. 

To have one less stressful thing to think about, I decided not to hate my hometown anymore. So, rather than saying the city is boring, I start making friends and going out, so it's not. 

Some things are going well, others not.

I feel kind of enough.

August: I don't know how I feel

I can't recall August based on the photos I took. But, it was, most likely, a mix of good and bad news from every side: relationships, jobs, and my mom.

I don’t know how I feel.

September: I feel kind of enough

I get laid off from my day job. Workdays were monotonous, and I planned to leave. But since they made me leave, I didn't know how to feel. Thus, I chose not to feel any negative emotions but to focus on how I wanted to leave either way.

I invest part of my severance in courses related to what I do for a living. I'm learning complex processes for clients and full-time positions for the first time in the year. I question why it took me, someone addicted to learning and experimenting, so long. Enough to feel dumb, but not enough to regret choosing to earn over learning.

For the first time in my career, I have no income. That thought creeps a few times per week, often right before making a significant expense. 

But I wasn't stressed. It was my month of not making any income, my costs were low, and I had worked with nearly fifty major tech companies at the time. Finding clients shouldn't take long, I thought.

I feel kind of enough

October: I feel enough

My best friend, who I lived with in Bogotá between late February and early July, flies to Europe. He'll spend a month there, hopping between countries for $30, living in the places I was supposed be at since May, and visiting a common friend of ours who I miss. 

I planned to go before losing my income. But I decide not to because it feels irrational and unacceptable. Not irrational but somehow acceptable, as overspending on my Mexico City was. 

So I just ask them for photos. Each one I slide is a reminder of my inability to do something I would love to do after close to four years of overworking at the expense of my health.

I fly to Cali, Colombia, where the girl I'm dating (who is my girlfriend, but we don't call ourselves that way) is and where she was born. It's a city where you can't move two blocks without hearing a speaker blasting salsa. A few months back, I took my first salsa lessons there. Now I'm addicted, so we go out to dance and salsa competitions, and I show her more salsa videos than she can stand. 

This new passion reminds me I used to like dancing as a child. And how and why, at some point, I decided to turn into a boring, emotionless robot. I wonder what other childhood habits I had stopped doing that I'm now revisiting. I think of reading, which I do daily, to write this newsletter. Of painting, which I exercise by finding artwork for this publication. And fashion, which I exercise by looking at YouTube videos.

I also wonder if we always go back to what we tended to like as children and if that should guide the job I find next. I become enthusiastic about what could come next.

I feel enough.

November: I feel kind of enough

"The day your mother dies, which will likely be in a year or two, she'll be thinking of you and your sister till the very end," says my father to me during our first father-son "date" of the year. 

I drop a tear. Both because I'm aware that's likely what will happen in this timeframe and also because I still haven't told her I love her. I'm still a bad son.

The girl I'm dating, who now recognizes she's my girlfriend, is living in her hometown full-time. I want to see her, and so does she. But it's been two months since I earned any income. And while I have enough savings to live for the next three years, spending without earning kills me. Every single day. I spend a few weeks overthinking it, but ultimately, I fly to where she is and have a good time.

I feel kind of enough.

December: I feel enough

In my writing, entrepreneurial communities and intellectual circles. I feel listened to, appreciated, and comforted, I begin sharing more of how I feel. For the first time in months, I go from being intellectually aware everything will be fine to believing it. So I act as if my income hadn't changed. I go out often, dance salsa thrice weekly, and study human behavior. 

Doctors' diagnoses of my mom vary. Some say she'll die soon. Seeing her lumps have reduced in size, others feel it's too soon to tell. 

I began the year seeking comfort from external sources. As the year progressed, I changed that. My life has arguably gotten worse since early 2022. It also became much more unpredictable. But, somehow, I learned to appreciate uncertainty. 

I feel enough.