A Light Filled Mind

I thought I was getting dragged into a game. Spontaneous games of tag and chase cropped up often. But it wasn’t a game. She kept avoiding me. I thought maybe it was a misunderstanding and we could talk it out. But she wouldn’t even talk to me. I asked other classmates and friends if they knew what was wrong, if I did something, missed something. All I got back was “she doesn’t want to be friends anymore.”

Surely, this wouldn’t go on for long. If there was no reason, it wouldn’t persist. But it did. We were in school together through 8th grade and never spoke again.

To be held. My god. I struggle with choosing what I know is correct and what I know is right. There is a difference. This time is for standing on my own two feet, killing that need for a savior once and for all. And yet, how am I to turn away from love? I am always always always turning towards love. I guess to my detriment. An indulgence of fear, that if I don’t make it number one priority, I will be punished by the one who “loves me.” Yet he never does. He never punishes me. He holds me. He Loves me.

I’m trying to trust this time, this unfolding of events, this “isn’t what I planned,” and I am scared. I am scared. Am I to believe that pursuing or choosing something that’s choosing me that takes me further from my love, that I will come to know love more deeply? I hate it, I hate what that idea implies about the impending struggle. Yet. I know it in my heart.

It’s almost like I am receiving an assignment. I don’t want to do it, but it is here nonetheless and it is For me, and the quicker I lean into it, the better. I don’t know. I can’t even pretend to know at this point. So the hope-apathy remains. It’s neither absent or full, it’s “well, I guess we’ll see.”

He had wise words about hope and youthful excitement. Perspective brings both understanding and acceptance, gratitude and resignation. For a very watery astrological being, I don’t love the ambiguity, it seems to increase as life goes on. Maybe it’s just my own awareness of my agency, or my naïveté.

I’m scared. I’m scared. My self doubt is pooling at the surface, leaves stuck in a pool filter. If I pick them out, one by one, will it all make sense then? I suppose not. I suppose I’ll always have leaves in the pool filter, and just when I think I’ve got them all cleaned out, they pop up again when I’m not looking.

I seem incapable of doing any of the things I say I want to, or need to, or ought to. The words of my father haunt me, too. I’m not working hard enough, I’m entitled, I don’t know what I’m doing. I really don’t. I am terrified. If it was possible for me to shrink away into the wilderness and become the leaf, the grass, the mushrooms, I would. I would take everyone’s memory of me too so they wouldn’t have to feel any pain.

My lover told me to “do something for myself for once.” I don’t know what he means. I thought all of this, all of this stupid independence I’ve been acting out was the something for myself. Maybe he means do something without thinking of anyone else first, without considering how my choice will impact the relationship. This feels like blasphemy, a trap, I know that it is not. But I recoil just the same. Again, my father’s words ringing in my ears.

How does a girl go from popsicle stick crafts to COO? It’s agonizing, I can tell you that much. I want to be doing popsicle stick crafts, lying in the grass, playing with dogs and babies. Am I on my way to becoming a gray haired woman who tells people, “oh well I had a lovely career running a business but I hardly ever found time for my passions. Don’t waste your life, dear, do what you love!”

I say it all now. I can’t take my own advice. I hate the constrictions of the world, my world, the one I chose and made for myself, the one unfolding before me. Will I ever be free of the frantic feeling of wanting to hit pause? Grasping wildly at any lever or button that looks like stop on this hideous roller coaster I’m on?

35. I thought I’d be kinda done with these thoughts by now. How does one find what they want and act on it? I’ve never known. Will probably never know. All my life I seem to be doing the next right thing and I don’t see that it’s gotten me anywhere I want to be. But I never know what is right or wrong, an argument can always be made for both.