How Far I've Come - Or How Far I've Gone
I've been blogging for over a year now, which means that I have archives to go back through.And what a long, strange trip it's been.A year ago, I was panic-stricken daily. Doing the work was a struggle similar to pushing boulders up a mountain, the weight my own assumptions and the mountain my life. Racing thoughts about worthiness, work and being "enough" choked even the smallest activity. The worry of what I should be doing versus what I wanted to be doing paralyzed me. Happiness was a thing that other people had that I didn't, like a new car or a designer handbag. It was infuriating. I felt so smart, so on top of my shit, and yet didn't have a fucking clue.In 8 years, I'd lived in 4 different places, 10 different apartments. I had roommates, I lived alone. I worked in an office, I worked from home. Writing crept in and out of my life. My circle of friends expanded and contracted, new people arriving and others drifting away. My long-distance relationship was many miles and phonecalls and then it was over, he was in my living room. My parents were a plane ride, a 4 hour drive, down a set of steps from me. I read books promising me productivity and happiness. One job was fantastically challenging with a crazy boss and another was completely boring with a nice boss. I worked out, I did yoga, I tried switching between coffee and tea. But nothing, I mean NOTHING helped.None of it helped because it was all outside of me. I was the one constant and consistent factor. And I couldn't keep living like that.Change your thoughts, change your life, right?It took months, a therapist that led me gently through waves of bewilderment, and allowing myself to go into a space between the life I'd been bending over backwards to have and the life that was right before me. I started making little bets...
Sometimes, in order to find the life you need, you need to leave the life you have – and navigate that uncertain space between. You have to declare yourself. You might have to be solitary for a while. You will encounter doubt and dark nights of the soul (although this would happen anyway). You will have to stand up against conformity and shed your false identity. ~Justine Musk post
I went through all of what Justine talks about in that post, and I'm sure to go through it all again. Such is life, but now I have perspective, I have faith in myself. And I have this deep contented feeling that my life is my own and whatever I'm here to do with it, I know I'll be led.I'd lived for so long with a false identity, I didn't know who I was. And I'm still sweeping the floors and shining the door knobs of my soul, but it's so lovely to be here on this side of it all. To know how far I've come, or really, how far I've gone, inside my life, into my own soul, and all I've discovered here.