It’s 4:00 AM on a Saturday and I’ve only had 3 hours of sleep. I am clearly on edge and the major reason, of course, is the pandemic sweeping across the world, leaving everyone just as tense and confused.
Certainly, other things make me worry, some of them completely random: Will I ever amount to anything greater? Will I die alone? Can I adequately protect and be there for the people I love? Was I just a diversity hire? What if I lose it all in an instant? Am I as outstanding as everyone seems to think I am? I wonder if my new team thinks I’m an idiot (To be fair, I am … but they don’t need to know that!). Hell, I’m talking to someone new right now for the first time in forever and can’t help but think how or when I’d mess things up.
I believe we all have anxious moments at some point in our lives, but mine just feels like it’s been on a marathon, and it’s not stopping anytime soon. Honestly, it feels like suffering sometimes but I would hate to admit that it is. I think I’ve lived in this state so long that it’s my ‘normal’. Or maybe I’m doing that thing where I compare myself to others. I mean some people have the most frightening panic attacks; I’d be a liar to admit that I know what that feels like. Or maybe it’s just the word ‘suffering’. It feels like admitting defeat. And if I’m admitting defeat, then I’m not strong, and if I’m not strong how can I be there for the ones I love, and if I can’t be there for the ones I love … then what’s the point of living at all. I know, I just did it again.
“The people’s champ must be everything the people can’t be.” – Chance the Rapper
I’ve always been drawn to the line above and even more so these last couple months because while I don’t have the ego to think of myself as this exemplary figure, I mostly feel like a product of unending love and support. There is this need to succeed and give back. I would be selfish not to.
“The more you pursue feeling better all the time, the less satisfied you become, as pursuing something only reinforces the fact that you lack it in the first place. The more you desperately want to be rich, the more poor and unworthy you feel, regardless of how much money you actually make … the more you desperately want to be happy and loved, the lonelier and more afraid you become, regardless of those who surround you.” – Alan Watts
For a while now I’ve just felt like running (metaphorically of course but man I need to hit the gym too) away from the things I considered challenges. Running to find peace. I even considered changing careers to one that would serve as a valid excuse to do so. But what I failed to realise is that running solves nothing, and sooner or later you come full circle back to the things that you were so desperately trying to avoid.
Moving forward, I choose acceptance. To make the best of what is not within my control, fulfil my purpose, and achieve true happiness.
Mindsmash 