enough soul-searching already

((a blurry and totally unrelated iPhone picture of some temporary tattoo business to get this party started))


So here's the sitch.

It's been quite the ghost town around here.. When it gets to the point that people are texting me saying -- in so many words -- "erm, excuse me. where are the posts?" I realize that I need to get myself together.

If I'm being totally honest here I've been in a quite a rut. I've been doing some soul searching and finding myself. Some regular figuring out what makes me tick. What makes me happy and what doesn't and who makes me happy and who doesn't. Sifting through the mess of thoughts. Which leads me to ask myself, "does everyone lose themselves and then have to go find themselves overandoverandover again?". Because all this "finding myself" is getting pretty exhausting. Seriously. I need to draw myself a map and keep it under the floorboards of my apartment and so when I start feeling lost I can get it out and go straight to the source.

A couple weeks ago I realized that I have a lot of unhappy lingering in my life. It's completely possible that this is unhappy that I create. Unhappy of my own doing. But unhappy nonetheless.

Things that seemed so second nature are not second nature right now. I'm sitting here staring at the computer screen and thinking, "wow. Lots of fragments happening here. Separated by run on sentences." But that's how my mind has been working lately. Either it's spiraling out of control and spinning and spinning and I can't get it to stop OR (and this is where it gets scary) I've figured out how to just totally shut my thoughts off so I don't have to deal with them.

UM. NO. not okay.


My friend Kacie calls it "putting your thoughts in a box and up on the shelf." She uses it to deal with not being able to turn her mind off and sleep. She puts her thoughts away to the back of her mind to deal with in the morning. So this is what I've been doing, only I leave the box on the shelf. And ignore it. And try to pretend like it's not there and maybe even bolt the door shut because I don't want those thoughts to come find me. How Dorian Gray of me.

I started losing myself and losing my writing voice and losing my mind.

I stopped writing.
I stopped taking pictures.
I stopped painting.
I stopped reading.
I stopped listening to music.

It's not a depression but it's just.. nothing. I looked into myself and realized I was beginning to become a shell of my former self. I don't want to be a shell.

So at risk of sounding like the girl in the assembly scene in Mean Girls and saying "I just have a lot of feelings" (she doesn't even go here!) I've just abandoned my writing and my poor camera and has been dead and sitting on the floor of my car.

But unfortunately when you don't deal with things they come back to haunt you. The box gets full and the closet gets full and then the room is full and the apartment in full and the street is full and all that undealt with emotion is heavy. So I'm figuring that out right now. Sifting through the mess. Cleaning out the closet.

Comments

Popular Posts