#198 - Doing It Scared (sde iv no. 5)

My life has felt...out of my control lately.

I've given up a lot of agency without realizing it, but also sometimes you just have to give other people space and time to come to their answers without being like an overbearing pressure monster breathing down their necks.

But I haven't wanted to take charge of my own life. Look at the mess I keep making of it!

Oh, no one's coming to save me from myself? I just have to keep growing and learning and trying my best and forgiving myself when it's not enough and continuing forward???

I don't get to do it when I'm finally perfect? I have to do it now??

But I'm scared! Anxious! Don't know where to stand and the bartender seems mad at me for some reason!!!

There's bills to pay and drinks to order babe, STEP UP! TIME TO GOOOOO!

Making myself do seven days of effort is always a way to get myself consistent and working on things. Usually I have so much to say that these act as a great release valve to let it all out and stop worrying so much about "importance" or feeling like I'm "bothering" people who signed up for my newsletter with...my newsletter.

Oh wait I'm not calling it that anymore! My blog!

But lately I just kind of feel like screaming in terror as the world crumbles around me and the future of the career I thought I would have feels like it's slipping through my fingers and while there are times I really REALLY believe in myself I just get so bogged down in the moments where I doubt myself and my like general understanding of myself and the world.

Like, I've only recently come to terms with the fact that I am wildly self-centered. I can dress it up in much softer language, but basically I allowed my childhood neglect to morph into adult assholery and I've been terrible about asking other people like how they're doing and just assuming that they, like me, are bursting at the seams to tell me everything and require no prompting (or space!!! when were people supposed to tell me things if I was hoggin' all the oxygen?). And it's good to recognize, even better to work on, but boy oh boy has it just felt like one massive realization after the other.

Grappling with the idea that who I am and who I thought I was are farther apart than I realized hasn't been a nice or pleasant feeling. But with my new GROWTH MINDSET I'm trying to learn lessons rather than wallow in self-disgust.

Years and years ago on tumblr I saw a graphic that I've never been able to source but have recreated (poorly) below:

The premise was, the smaller the triangle/the closer all of those ideas were, the happier we are as people.

When we mean what we say, we say what we actually mean, and we get taken at face value with no misinterpretations?

Heaven!

Amazing!!!

What a lovely world to live in!

I'm scared. I'm scared of the power I have to hurt others, to deprive myself of the life I actually want, I'm scared that knowing better doesn't mean it won't take practice and it feels like I'm decades behind.

(And I am trying not to be really bitter about that because it will get me nowhere and allows me to fall back into the pattern of seeking people to blame for situations instead of just allowing myself to move forward with the newly gained knowledge from any given situation!)

Is writing about it helpful?

Idk, it's making me feel like I have to get over it if I admit it. I haven't written a purely navel-gazey personal essay in a while so why not do it in the middle of a writing streak where everything has felt futile and politics is so scary and sad right now that all I can bring myself to do is send mean emails to my feckless reps and donate to Zohran's campaign for Mayor of New York City.

And it IS incredible what one good campaign and one passionate politician can do for my quality of life improvement.

Doesn't make it easy but it does make it easier! Mostly I just want to find a space in my neighborhood that I can scream REALLY loud in without scaring anyone around me.

I don't want the practice I'm getting re: being honest with people who are super important to me, but it's happening so I can either resist or I can learn to love the process.

What's in my control? Me. How much I love myself. How much opportunity I'm giving myself to improve my life.

Y'know, the small things!

I'm trying my best to make the triangle smaller.

&& I think having a much better sense of who I actually am will really help the equation.