I kind of noticed how disgustingly jealous and competitive I can get sometimes. I'm sure it's all healthy to some extent, but I don't like the idea of turning into the green-eyed monster when a friend does better than me in something. Human nature forces me to intially think "damn you, asshole did better than me," then think, "oh dang this person must have worked hard, they deserve it." It's that whole Freud thing going on here though. There are no slips. I've always somewhat believed in that, and my actions seem to further support that crazy hypothesis. I try to see it like.. your other thoughts, the more positive ones, are the ones that actually matter, and they can counterbalance all the natural negative ones. I'm so optimistic sometimes. It's so uncharacteristic, don't you think?

You know what's pretty pathetic? I know I have different goals than a certain person, yet I always feel that I can't let them completely beat me academically. In fact, our interests and strong points are the complete opposites from one another, yet I still try to compare myself to this person. It's outrageous how stupid I can be. But on the other hand, I genuinely admire this person's worth ethic. They are able to sacrifice a lot more than I can physically sacrifice for school. The problem is that I'm too cocky to try to model myself after this person. And another prospect that comes into play is that I don't have any real goals, so how can I even know what to work for. I can't work for a seemingly pointless cause! Everyone needs a dream to live. That's the only useful idea I got from reading Gatsby.