Tag: nonfiction

“Hell’s Paradise” Review

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Yuji Kaku’s Hell’s Paradise: Jigokuraku is something of a breath of fresh air in the manga scene. With so much of market saturated by isekai, Hell’s Paradise offer’s something unique.

A shonen version of Homer’s The Odyssey, Hell’s Paradise tells the story of Gabimaru the Hollow — a ninja from a village notorious for raising the most efficient and ruthless ninja. Betrayed by his comrades, Gabimaru is condemned to die. His training and upbringing tell him this is acceptable. And, yet, he does not want to die. He has found something in life worth holding on to. He realizes he loves his wife, and he wants to be reunited with her.

Realizing his drive to live, and his skill, the executioner Yamada Asaemon Sagiri recruits him to undertake a mission of mythic proportions. The objective is simple enough… to understand, that is — recover the Elixir of Life from the Pure Lands, and he will be pardoned for his crimes.

The land they journey to is both ethereal and foreboding. Teeming with flowers, gods, and sages, it is a forbidden land where death is a blessing when it blossoms, and a curse when you must beg for it.

Gabimaru and Sagiri must form a uncertain alliance to survive the island, and the other criminals sent to claim both the Elixir and the Pardon. But they are the least of the threats they must face.

This manga is very well done. The artwork and story are as close to perfect as possible. The story is as close to an epic as manga can come, and completely original.

Though this is an adult manga — with very adult scenes — I highly recommend it.

The major themes of this manga deal with people being more than they were raised to be, finding love and coming to believe they deserve to be loved, and learning to let go of who they’ve been told they are in order to embrace who they can become.

All 13 volumes of this manga series carry the same epic energy, and its conclusion is perfect. I was not left wanting after I completed it.

Rating: 10/10: Definitely Recommend

Dream Journal, Entry 3

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From some time in 2009.


This is an old dream I had.

I was sitting in a theatre, listening to a professor giving his lecture on stage. The auditorium was structured so that each member of the audience was sitting in their own little room — and these rooms could double as showers. Many of the members of the audience were showering while the lecture was going on.

It was then that I fell asleep, and had a dream within my dream. I do not remember this second-layer dream, but I remember “waking up” into the first-layer dream. The professor was furious at me for sleeping in his lecture, so he went behind the curtain, removed his face, and revealed he was a triceratops, and ordered a golem to kill me.

Following that, I don’t remember much before waking up.

Dream Journal, Entry 2

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Date: Sometime between 2009 and 2010.

I remember this being a brief nightmare.
I was standing in the middle of a white room, where the walls held a lite glow. I felt something bad was approaching, but didn’t know what. A sensation crept up my back, and rested on my shoulder. It was a hand. When I turned around to see who it was, I saw my father; he was naked, and his mouth was split open in a Chelsea grin from ear-to-ear. Blood ran down his mouth, chin, and torso and he heaved and gurgled as he laughed.
I woke up with a start, and lay in bed wide awake for a while after that.

Restarting Therapy

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There was a time in high school — when I was about 18 or 19 — when I asked my mom if I should see a therapist. She discouraged the idea; believing that having a “record” like that would limit my opportunities in life. You see, my parents are of a generation that viewed any mental illness diagnosis as a stigma. And, when I was still in high school, that stigma was still strong. I don’t blame them for this; it’s just how it was.

Eventually, I made the decision in the late spring, early summer, of 2021 to finally find a therapist. It was something I had wanted to do off-and-on for a while, but never got around to.

I had seen counselor when I returned to college, seeking a second degree. That counselor operated as part of a free service provided to students at Auburn University of Montgomery. A minor car accident — where I hit the rear of a car, that was stopped at a stop light, in 2017 — led me to this counselor. I just wanted someone to help me through some of my anxiety about the accident, and help me with my obsessive compulsive disorder.

I forget how long I went, but after about eight months I had to stop going; I had decided to end my pursuit of a second degree, and, as students were the only ones who could access this service, I could no longer access this service.

So, why did I wait so long to seek another counselor?

To keep it simple: I lacked the resources, I didn’t know how badly I need it, and I didn’t know where to start looking.

I recognized I had OCD as far back as high school, and I had been prone to bought of loneliness and depression for a while. By 2020, I believed I was barely functioning, but I told myself, “barely functioning is still functioning.” 

Like many, my life radically changed in 2020. The pandemic brought new personal challenges, but also opened new opportunities for me. Around the same time, I converted to Catholicism, and the moral and spiritual issues I faced added to my stress. 

These converging events, led to a moment where I realized I needed help. So, I began seeking out a therapist.

My first attempt at finding a therapist failed, the one I reached out to didn’t think she could provide the kind of counseling I needed. She referred me to two other therapists, but they never responded to my inquiries.

Feeling discouraged, I didn’t revisit the issue until the fall of 2021 — sometime around October of that year. Once again, I reached out to a therapist, and I got very lucky. She was taking on new patients, and she could help me with my anxiety, OCD, and depression.

Earlier, I alluded to how I thought I was barely functioning in society. However, once I started therapy, I began to realize I had not been functioning for some time. I had allowed my job, anxiety, and loneliness to consume my life; it was to the point where all I could do just to get out of bed in the morning, get to work, and get home from work after eight hours. 

That realization was a lot. But it meant that I had made some progress. 

Currently, I am still see my therapist, and I am very grateful. I really believe this was a major turning point in my life, and am much happier with my life. That said, I still have a long way to go, and I hope my therapist can endure me for a while longer.