Electroshock

Sometimes I want to collapse on the sidewalk and be absorbed by the concrete.

Maybe the sound of rushing water will stop. The constant repetitive rhythm of liquid and air, filling and ebbing. Or I could press my nose against the cold glass while I am hung up high. Pretend that the floor is moving towards me, coming closer. The sun just cuts slits through the clouds. I cannot feel it. The heat escapes too easily. I cannot see what is real. I cannot feel what exists. My mind is grabbing on to fever visions. I wish I could tell you. I wish I could show you the depths. I swim alone in murky waters.

The roads that bleed out. They follow me in the shadows. I can feel it creeping up, begging to break.

Sometimes I just want to be struck and feel the bruised on the fractured.

But how can I ask when it could mean the unraveling? The days repeat; the cycle makes me nauseous. Spin in and spin out, everything the same. I have only three modes now and none of them are fair. If strength is given, why not to me? I try to create change, but care for the rotting. How can you not hate this yet? You will soon tire as you must. But I am prepared for the season. Maybe because I brought it to pass this time. All that is there is the dark, the darkness, the deepening.

This time not alone, I know not how to be here again. Forever and always soon to begin.

Like Clockwork

I feel like I have died. I am slowly starting to be revived. But I no longer feel like the person I once was, like my youth was taken in one fell swoop. Now that I think about it, I am realizing that this is the second time that I have felt like I have had to start over with a shell of my self. There is something about going through heavy experiences, ones that have long term effects on your mind and body, that make it seems as though you've shed your former being. As though you know too much to see things plainly.

This death and slow new beginning are so hard to explain to anyone outside of my closest friends. If someone has not gone through a similar experience, they have no comprehension of the depth of the damage. People seem to think I have just disappeared, like it was a choice. Or that I no longer care for who and what I used to. But I have spent the last year in deep pain and fear over the unknown and the ever changing. One's health is something that is so easy to take for granted. I had no idea how dehumanizing or how debilitating chronic illness could be. I have dealt with chronic pain for so long, but adding constant illness on top of that is like taking away the ability to be oneself. This has been one of the hardest years of my life. My brain is racing and dying to explore, but my body has been incapable of keeping up. I know that things like this bring character. I know that it has made me appreciate things more than I have before. But I feel as though I am 26 and forced to live as though I'm 86. Always managing pain, always managing symptoms. Every time I feel as though I am on the mend, something pushes me back down. I have to have energy to be able to maintain and build the energy, but have none to start the process with. I am told the residuals could linger for several more years. I feel forced to spend the remaining years of my twenties trying not to explode or fall apart.

On the other hand, I have been made to care for myself in ways that I thought I would not be able to do. I gave up bad habits. I gained better ones. This clanging alarm helped me to establish a way of life at a young age that could save me from the repercussions that appear in old age. But still... I feel very tired of fighting. I feel very tired of crying. I feel very tired of saying no. My choices feel so limited from where I stand. I just have to keep focused on the things that are in my control. And focus on the things that are good in my life. I will never be able to be the person I once was again. But maybe that is more of a blessing than I realize.

New Opportunities, Lessons Learned

Getting older means that priorities change. But at what point does it become just giving up and settling down? I feel as though I have done most of what has been asked of me, most of what I was supposed to do. But I can't help but think of all the things that I did not do. And where I might be in life if I had followed my passions and not just become the responsible one.

I know I am not in a bad spot, but I am not happy with where I am at right now (in a grand scheme of things sort of way, not so much a young person climbing the ladder in a hurry sort of way). I was the good kid and I followed the good jobs with good benefits and good opportunities. But now all I have are conservative skills and creative leanings.

People that I have been talking to lately have said that everyone hates their jobs and that is just how adult life is... but I refuse to accept that every single adult human is generally unhappy in life everyday. 'Pursue your hobbies on your off time!', they say. But if you commit the majority of your time and effort to something like a 40+ hour work week, shouldn't you at least like the job or at least feel rewarded in some way beyond monetary compensation? I don't feel capable of expending any extra energy on extra curricular activities after working all day, all week, because I find interacting with people and doing uncreative work to be emotionally and physically draining. I don't have anything left to give to the stuff that feeds me in my off hours. If you have a job that meets your physical needs, you don't have the time and motivation to work on your art. But if you have only your art, your physical needs nagging at you so that you cannot be comfortable enough from hunger and cold to create.

What is the answer then? Do we all just have to try to cram in as much as we possibly can into the week in hopes that we get it all accomplished? Do we give up security for spiritual contentment or vice versa? Do we try to find a career that is as close to our passion as possible and hope that that energizes us enough to seek our art further?

I refuse to be foolish or reckless in my decisions as an adult, but I also would like to refuse to be apathetic or blindly accepting. I am not sure which path will bring me closer to some sense of peace or accomplishment, but I feel very far away from where I originally intended myself to be. I feel like a poisoned version of myself. The farther I get along in adulthood, the worse I feel from stress and dissatisfaction, which makes it that much harder to get back to being the way that I was when I was somehow able to devote all of my free time to artistic endeavors. It is a vicious cycle that feels too difficult to break. Maybe periods of creativity like that only happen when you are young or without financial worry.

I keep telling myself that I should just give up music or give up writing, but it is like an itch. Not being creative makes me feel like something is missing or like something is wrong. I am compelled. Even when it is an obligation of some sort, I still get more out of doing little projects than almost anything else.

Since I have been so ill for the past year, I have had to convince my brain that I had to work on getting better above all else and that things needed to go on the back burner. But now that I am finally on the mend, I feel like I have forgotten how to do things, because so much time has passed. My muscles have atrophied. I have played the piano less than five times in the last year and a half, I think. And now I am scared to do it, because I am afraid I won't know how to do it anymore (as if over a decade of lessons would just disappear) or that I will get too easily frustrated at my inability to do as well as I used to. I have been asked about playing so many times lately and I hate that I have nothing to say but that I have not been doing anything musical. It used to be my identity. And now it feels like another person, in another time.

I am so scared of failing that it constantly keeps me from trying. I keep talking myself out of challenges and opportunities because it feels so much harder than it used to feel. And it all comes back to the beginning of the first paragraph. I don't want to wonder about what I did not do anymore. I want to see where life will lead me and not expect the unexpected to be automatically bad. If I do not create, what will have the been the point of being here? If my life is just working, sleeping and eating, then why bother caring about anything? That is not enough to sustain someone. I only have so long to do what I love, so why am I acting as if fear of failure is somehow a stronger force than death? Shouldn't the idea that life is short and finite motivate me to do as much as I can while I can? I am young enough to start over and old enough to know better than before.

So This Is The New Year

It is my birthday today. It has probably been the heaviest birthday I have had for quite some time. I consider myself rather blessed in so many parts of my life. But I cannot ignore the things that are glaring at me. My health has been quite bad almost the entire year since my last birthday.
My job has been a source of constant stress and cause for far too many days of crying to count.
I feel as though my family and I will never be the same again since I so boldly crossed an uncrossable line. They love me but there is still a very palpable shift and I am overrun with guilt. I feel as though every time I make a decision that is closer towards the life I want, I cause them great disappointment.
I have great and many friends, but all of them are also in transition and this is the first time in a long time that I have been this acutely aware of the distance between us. Not of our own making. But people get older, priorities shift and responsibilities suck up too much time to leave much left over.
I know things will get better. I even have hope that they will get better soon. But I have been so drained, emotionally and mentally, that I am having a hard time just maintaining some sense of OK.
I am very lucky to have a solid and healthy relationship. It is one of the few things that eases the discomfort from the difficulties. But I worry so often, despite the denial of it, that I am dragging him down into my turmoil. He is so balanced that I would hate to tip him over into the big mess of my cyclical mind. As a good friend of mine once told me, I feel everything and I feel deeply. It is one of the things that some people like best about me and also one of my biggest burdens.
I do not remember the last time that I was able to be content outside of a very controlled environment. If I stay in the bubble, I can find some sense of calm for awhile. But I cannot just be a hermit. And I cannot breathe inside of my anxiety. It tumbles and falls into other parts. From one aspect to another. I get so worked up and wrapped up in tiny insignificant conversations, spinning around until I want to vomit them out. It makes no sense. It means that I fear being forced to live life at all most days. Because being human means feeling pain and experiencing trauma and not always being good enough. I wonder how people are able to feel as though they can take on the world, when I feel incapable of just dealing with my own tiny piece of the planet. I know that I will come out of this on the other side a stronger and more able person. But the growing pains are leaving marks.

First World Problems of an Educated Millennial

It is a strange contrast. My personal life feeling so fulfilling. My professional life feeling so lacking. In my relationships, I have never felt more secure or grateful. But although I am not doing meaningless work, I have no sense of accomplishment anymore.

I think it comes down to a few things. First of all, I am getting to the point when I do not want to be someone's assistant. Not that I think it is beneath me. I just feel like I have done it and I would like to start whatever phase is next in life. I am too motivated and hard working to stay at the bottom. I want to make a difference. I want to have some sort of control in the path of my career. I would like a career and not just a job.

But even just finding a job is difficult these days. There a hundred workers for every position and so few ways to be able to distinguish yourself from the rest. Those who are the best employees don't always have the greatest resumes. And those that are charismatic and charming are often just that.

People keep telling me to go back to school. But to study what? Many fields are in decline, others are over-saturated. I have no desire to take on thousands of dollars in debt. I have been working full time for too long to take a pay cut. I have been living as an adult with adult bills since I was 19. I feel stuck and unable to change the situation. I keep working and striving and looking and researching but it yields nothing. And even if it were to yield something new, would it just be new and not better?

I realize that this is just the existence of a 20 something. We all must go through awkward and unsatisfactory periods to appreciate what comes in later days. I am not in a bad situation. It could be far worse. I have some education. I have the trust and respect of my coworkers and bosses. I have a retirement fund. I am far ahead of most of my generation. This is the era of delayed adulthood. And I managed to dive head first into it before it become impossible to achieve.

But here is where I divide. The jobs that pay well and would support me as an adult and not just a part-time worker/college student with four roommates are jobs that are in offices. They require stuffy clothes. And tidy hair. And less eye-makeup. And covered up tattoos.

I am going through a strange process in which I feel as though I must undo all that I have done to make myself the way I want to be, undo the things and unlearn the ways that I present to the world to express who I am as an adult. Both because of the competitive job market and because I only have experience in conservative fields. But the idea of doing that, as silly as it may seem, makes me feel like I am separating from my identity. Like I am compromising what I want for what everyone else wants. I have been sitting and stirring and thinking about whether I would be willing to seem "normal" again if a potential employer asked me to... and I actually feel like I would have to mourn the loss of my old self in the event that I decided that it was worth it.

But here I am at the age when these things are not accepted as a silly juvenile phase but as an outright rejection of nice society. I live in a great city that embraces weirdos, but even Portland cannot change the minds and biases of those who make the decisions surrounding my future. Those of a previous generation have become like their fathers and their fathers before them. They reached a crossroads as I did and gave up on being the next great rock guitarist or the next great football star and accepted the job that would allow them security in which to raise a family. And although not everyone can be a rock star and not everyone can be a pro athlete and there is nothing wrong with pursuing a happy home life, many look down on those that did not do the same once their age marred their visions. These are the men and women that get to decide whether or not I get to move forward with my life, however unconventional it may seem to them.

I wish I had more faith in people's ability to see goodness in others. I wish that I myself had the ability to see goodness in others. But there are too few left that are willing to take a chance anymore. We are bogged down by a terrible economy, crushing debt and a fear of the end of so much. I have long given up my dream of being in a creative field, of being paid to be artistic. I would just like to be somewhere that does not drain me so much that I cannot find the will to pursue it on my own time.

Quarter Century Curve Ball

I feel old and young at the same time.
Wiser, more experienced, yet so completely unsure.
The world treats me as an adult sending me credit card applications and offering me home loans and saying I should start thinking about retirement plans and settling down.
And yet, my brain is the same as it has ever been.
Though I have learned much, so very much, I still feel like young and awkward me. Like I am a teenager with a fake ID.
The decisions I have made and get to make in this decade of my life will shape so much of my future.
And it is equally exciting and frightening. Reinventing myself and detouring my paths as needed.
But I feel like I am on the precipice of many beginnings and many ends. Like this point in my life is one of bated breaths and elation and disappointments and pleasant surprises. Not entirely hopeful, but not entirely distraught either.
I know that life offers certain bad things with the good, risks with chances, consequences to choices. But I also know that you can never know what might come your way. You can never know where things will lead you. And sometimes you find things you didn't even know you were looking for. Needing things you didn't know that you wanted.
I am not where I thought I would be, but that is not said in negativity. Two months ago, two years ago... parts of life seemed very far away.
I have spent so long working to get to certain points in life, both externally and internally.
It's interesting to see so much of it pay off. And I almost appreciate the let downs that have come thus far if not only to keep me humble and grounded.
This all sounds so "inspirational" or mushy and didn't really come out like I hoped.
But I guess it basically comes down to this.
I am grateful for my friends and family, for my home, for the opportunities given to me, for the things I cannot describe but would not be here without. If I have one wish for the next quarter of a century of my life, it is that I never take for granted what is right in front of me.

Polar Opposites

I teeter between self preservation and self destruction.
Though it seems as though a very wide expanse could live between these two polar opposites, the line is very fine indeed.
In fact, if I am not exactly in between, my pendulum swings all the way to either side.

The idea of anything harmful but avoidable drives me to wrap myself up as tightly as possible as to not let the wrong things in. To keep it all out is to keep safe in case the good things go bad. I seek distance and loneliness to maintain a controlled world of very few variables. I was born with tendencies toward severe anxiety, stress and depression. So it is that I block out that senses and outside forces that would aggravate these tendencies. As best I can, that is. Because life happens so widely outside one's realm of understanding and will.

So when under these closed-in environments, negative things still occur, things that deeply shake me down, I am spurned to the other side. Practically embracing nihilism and fatalism and existentialism. I seek out things that are short term bursts of life and end up as long term spirals of doubt. I figure that if I cannot control things to keep me well that I might as well just do exactly as I please. I might as well experience everything I can while I can because the light will go out soon enough. Like the melancholy cousin of carpe diem.

But when I am locked up, I am so cold and empty.
And when I am out and lashing, I am stone and anger.

I cannot maintain the in between for long. The smallest infractions trigger the biggest fall outs. I absorb everything so deeply, so perceptible am I to others' reactions and follies. It comes in and rots and begins the cycle again.

I do not expect happiness. I just wish for some form of peace. To be able to sleep. To be able to let things go. To be able to grow and move and learn. To be able to process in a healthy way.
I feel as though I have done so much work already. I keep wondering when I will get to coast a little, when something will not constantly require more of me.
I am hoping as I age it will become easier. But it seems so far away.

And perhaps this is my strict upbringing or some sort of distorted Puritanism, but I feel as though I will never deserve to not be so heavy souled. It is as though I have used up all of my graces and what has come to me is what should be with me. Someone must pay for my transgressions. I am scared to move forward because I am never sure when I have finished paying. Life costs too much. It requires too much of me. I would rather forgo the good if it means I could forgo the bad. The repercussions of my self destruction are likely to reinforce my self preservation.