Life is funny.
I spent a large portion of my adult life wishing I could live alone. Wishing I could have my privacy, my independence…my own adulthood. My own place to allow myself to be myself in every capacity, in every moment. I’ve lived on my own for 7 months and…I’m OK I guess. It’s not everything I could have ever wanted, but it’s…OK. I guess.
I’m not happy, and I know that much. I say that phrase so often that I wonder if I’ll even recognize it when it happens. I spent a large portion of my summer interacting with new people…people that have no former expectations of me. Going places with people who I feel I don’t have to hide from because they look to me as someone worth looking up to. And it’s not like I haven’t ever had that before…even in my long term relationships with long term friends, they find ways to make me feel impactful to them. But, I’ve felt more like myself…openly and unabashedly myself.
The problem is…I don’t care about that person still.
And maybe I shouldn’t say I don’t care…because that’s a bit disingenuous. I care. Just not in the capacity that makes my unhappiness worth it. I HOPE I continue to strive for better. I HOPE I do get better. I HOPE I reach some point in my life that makes the struggle to this point worth it. I hope. But if it doesn’t…I sometimes wonder if I’ll regret missing out on things. Maybe it’ll be a blessing in disguise – that maybe I don’t live long enough to experience the disappointment of failing to achieve the things I want to achieve. That I die as having potential and not wasting it.
This is my greatest fear. That I’ll have nothing to show for the life and talents I’ve been blessed with. But here I am talking about blessings…I don’t deserve blessings. I don’t deserve to achieve the things I wish I could…or even feel like I could achieve. I forsake my faith so often; in pursuit of things that keep me far away from the grace needed to accept my blessings. And then I hide from the fact that I could easily find my way back. And I hide because I’m just pulled towards momentary fixes – things that bring happiness for seconds. A limited amount of solace.
I often think that maybe things are going the way they are because God is choosing to hide the green grass from view; not in a punishment but in a lesson about accepting help. But never help from others, but help from Him. Maybe I need to realize that God can help me more than money can…more than a career switch…more than female companionship.
But I’m so unhappy lately that I feel a drastic change is what I need. But that scares me into hiding away again; into just trudging away on this path of what can only be described as mediocrity. I wish I could find a different way to view my current predicament.
“Hard to see the forest through the trees” type shit.
I’ve been wondering lately if life HAS to mean something. If just accepting your lot within it is all you need to do in order to achieve peace; all you need to achieve anything. They say acceptance is the first step to recovery – what if it’s the same in recovering from delusion too? I mean, it IS delusion right? To expect a life of significance? To expect greatness? Is that delusion for the every day person living in an age of social enlightenment and connectivity that the world has never seen before? To believe that they matter; that their existence makes a sizeable impact on those around them?
I once wrote a thing about referencing this – that not everyone’s name gets etched in stone; that not everyone gets a mention in the history books. But God, please, I don’t want that to be me. I so don’t want that to be me.
It’s impossible to look at the things I create and feel like they’re better off not being shared. Not because I think they’re masterpieces…but instead because I think they’re flawed. Like me. Creations meant to connect with others…to make others feel connected to me. To allow others to see their flaws, and their missteps in pieces of art that reflect my own back at them. Pieces of me that remind them that we’re in this together. That we’re never going to be perfect, and that’s OK. That we’re still there for others to latch on to. That’s why I create; that’s why I’m driven to want more out of my life than what is currently offered out to the world.
I know we all can’t have our names etched in the hallways of history…but God, please…I do.
But again. I’m at an impasse. I stare at myself every morning and wish to see a different face. Wish to see a different body, hear a different voice. Live a different life…
I’ve dreamed for so long about having my own space within the world to fold into myself, but now all I long for is to not be lonely anymore. I miss my family. I miss having a safe place to go and be told I am all of the things I wish to be to others. That my name will be etched in history because my family sees the things I wish to be to the rest of the world in my eyes. I’ve been all of the things to them for the entire time I’ve been in their lives, and I miss feeling that.
So, now I sit in my apartment. Playing Bumble speed dating. Listening to sad music…again. Hoping that maybe I come across an answer in this very limited noggin of mine.
I always feel like I’m drunkely stumbling along within the nooks and crannies of my brain while writing these posts, thinking I’ll fall across an answer like a comfortable mattress. Instead I trip over a roller skate I haven’t worn in 16 years and fall face first into a bucket of piss water. That’s a metaphor for pissing the bed. Being afraid to leave at night because I heard a noise in the living room…so I stay put and keep myself covered in my own mistakes.
I’m afraid of being made out to be a phony. A fraud. A failure. So instead of trying, I just allow myself to be one for lack of doing so.
I’m not sure I can handle the confirmation on the oft chance I do try.
So lately life is less amusing and more just…unfortunately happening. I’m sure I’ll find a way out of the funk, but right now…it seems like it’s stuck wafting around me. A smell of urine reminding me that my past mistakes have defined me and that they won’t be gone any time soon.
Life and it's Musings 