day 2

I'm not having a good day. I'm always mildly discontent (depressed doesn't seem like the correct word any more) yet optimistic. I have sporadic moments of extreme happiness, often helped along by alcohol -though not always- but they never last. I also have periods of days or sometimes weeks where I do feel legitimately depressed and have a lot of trouble getting out of bed and going about my day.  I've been in this cycle for a very, very long time and see no end to it. Over the past couple of years I've stopped thinking so much about my mental health and focused more on the circumstances of my life, I figured that if my life was better overall my happiness would kind of just fall in to place.  This is definitely true to a point, and I guess I won't know the rest for sure until the day comes when I'm content with my life, which is very difficult to imagine ever happening. I've wondered that many times, am I even capable of true happiness? Is anyone?  I do know I'm able to sustain levels of happiness that are much higher than my current state. In the past I always relied on myself to cheer me up, I guess I hadn't realized how much I was relying on someone else to make everything feel OK, to make the day to day crap feel worth it. I'm in this raw state of trying to heal my body and my heart, and everything outside feels so harsh. I am pure work in progress. As usual, I'm optimistic yet afraid. This new year could be really, really great for me, and as much of a new start as I could hope for, or I could remain stuck. I'm relying very heavily on this possibility of a change of jobs, if it doesn't happen I need a major overhaul in strategy. Either way I can't wait anymore, I need more change.

I'm always so reluctant to say these things out loud, whenever I feel like this and try to express anything it seems to scare people. I guess it sounds darker than it feels. I can't stand when people worry about me, there's never anything to worry about, it always passes. I've come to accept it more or less, I'm no longer that kid who's fascinated by her own mental illness and actually thinks there is some way out of it waiting to be found.  I think there is a LOT I can do to improve the quality of my life and my well being, which I am working on, but this will always be with me in some way.  And it's probably good for me to be getting this all out of my system, the past 2 or 3 weeks have brought a major flood of emotion when I hadn't been feeling much other than a vague anxiety for months. I knew this time would come, and I think I needed this.

the whale has returned to the ocean, the horse to the pasture

It has been a strange few years and they've gone by in a daze. I've changed so much and for the first time in my life I don't really know who I am anymore. I feel as lost and aimless as ever. My vices have finally caught up with me. I've experienced many new things. I've loved and been loved in ways I thought I was incapable of. I've grown up a lot. I'm better and I'm worse.
This is all frightening as I really have lost myself along the way, and just generally transitioned into adulthood rather poorly, but I think it's a positive thing. I've actually been willing to give up myself in search of who I'm becoming and need to be. That is a major thing for me, if I've ever been guilty of anything it's been holding on to things for too long. I'm learning to let go, and man, the timing is on the money. I'm right in the midst of a major lesson on that subject.

long lost something

It has been a while.

I haven't been sleeping this week, so I figured I might as well get up and do something different rather than tossing and turning some more.  I looked through my phone and saw the growing collection of little notes I've taken down over the past year or so, and realized that everything I've been writing has been thrown away or forgotten about.  So here I am. I think I will add some old bits that have been lying around, and some new thoughts of course.  I love those post it size expressions of whatever happens to be on my mind, everything more in depth usually feels monotonous. Probably because I'm in need of writing classes, but that was the whole point of this after all: scattered thoughts- no real theme or cohesion.  Just recorded thoughts, nothing more.

On that note, I'll start here:


8-4-12

Going through my old unopened boxes is a stark reminder of my sentimentalism. It's not nearly so pronounced as it used to be, but still present. Some things are lovely mementos that I can't believe have survived for so long, and others are no longer meaningful but somehow still difficult to part with clutter. It's comforting and daunting at the same time. Part of me wants to keep a couple choice objects and toss the majority of it, the other part just wants to put it all in a box and come back to it much much later.