The thing is, when a truth cold clocks you in the jaw and knocks you out, you realize you can’t really ignore it anymore. It’s in your face.
Face the truth.
So here I sit with a bruised jaw, two black eyes, a busted lip, and a broken nose, figuratively speaking.
Here’s a hard truth. I’ve spent 52 years living someone and anyone else’s life. If someone didn’t see what I was doing, pat me on the back, tell me I was doing a good job, and give me compliments - if what I was doing didn’t get anyone’s approval, then what I did didn’t happen and has no value. If someone didn’t tell me I was pretty, it meant I was ugly. If someone didn’t tell me I was smart, it meant I was dumb. If someone didn’t tell me I was good enough, it meant I was worthless. And it didn’t matter who. It could be anyone. I may have lived in Nevada, Oklahoma, Kentucky, Washington, and Nebraska, and on my way back to Kentucky, but I reside in the land of external validation. Please see me. Please tell me I’m good enough. Please tell me I’m worthy. Please tell me that something about me makes your life better in some way. Someone? Anyone?
Here’s another. I can’t just do a thing. What I mean is that when I learned to sew, it was fun, and creative, and gave my hands and mind something to do in the silence. But as soon as I realized I could make different things like purses, chapstick holders, scrunchies, quilts, then all the sudden I wanted to build my own sewing business where I could sell things at craft shows and online. Look, I learned to sew, but barely. I had a $99 sewing machine that my mother in law gifted to me when she was trying to give my spiraling brain a safe space to spend its time. But I most certainly was not good at it. I made 3 quilts for my grandkids, one for my mom, in addition to the practice quilt I made when I was learning. I made coin purses, purses, chapstick holders, and tissue holders for my nieces for Christmas, and they were so bad but so full of love. Yet, I was going to turn it into a business. I did the same thing with my baking - “Grandma’s Faerie Good Bakery.” I can’t just write for the sake of writing, I have to be the best writer that ever lived and my words have to alter the world’s psyche for the better. I can’t just work at a bank. I have to have the best average call time, after call work, adherence, and attendance. If I get a drink, it has to be large, even if I know I won’t drink it all because I always go big or I feel like I’m small. I can’t just be a friend, I want to be the “best” friend. I’ll even do you one better – I want to learn new skills so I can master them, sell them, and teach them. Knitting, anyone?
Want another? Here we go. I’ve always felt like I was special. Like I was sent to Earth on a mission. That I was an Indigo Child who birthed Crystal Children who would take part in leading a revolution. I felt like I had charisma in spades, but that it was a tool in my kit to draw people’s attention toward spiritual evolution. I felt like that’s why I learned Tarot, too. I was supposed to help people get back on the right path. In other words, I spent the entirety of my life feeling like my existence, for lack of a better way of putting it, was a gift to the planet. Like I was here to save the world. Like I was, what? A Messiah? Then, in 2015, when I had a break with reality, my therapist introduced me to the idea of grandiose visions, and I was immediately stripped of my spiritual ambassadorship and made small. Rather than standing on the mountain yelling, “Hey, look at me! Over here! I have to tell you something that will help you! Guys, this way!” I started cowering in the corner with my arm shielding my face hoping to stay invisible. And that’s where I’ve been the past year and a half. My life had no purpose. I wasn’t special anymore. I was “sick.” I needed medicine. I needed to learn how to live with anxiety disorder, PTSD, and bipolar disorder.
Okay, one more. One more. Here’s another truth with a mean right hook: I cannot sit in stillness. I can’t. I’ve tried so hard and it’s all but impossible. If I’m not doing - cleaning the house, writing freelance, working at the bank, or doing something “important” or “productive,” then I’m being lazy. My life circles back to, “If they (someone, anyone) saw me just sitting here doing nothing, what would they think?”
Who the fuck is “they” and why do I care what they think about what I’m doing with my spare time in the privacy of my own home?
My first attempt to calm that chaos was to read. And I don’t just mean casually read a book between tasks and on breaks, but I mean devouring literature to the tune of 15-20 books in a month. Fixating. Hyper focusing. Obsessive. Why? Because I have to be the best reader ever.
That’s part of why I keep trying to start new projects - it's to feel like I have purpose and to keep myself busy so I’m not lazy, unproductive, and a deadweight who doesn’t contribute to society.
And so after all of that, I’m sitting here doing what? Trying to build the best mystical website ever, a magical treasure trove of data, a map of my brain, my most authentic, divinely inspired writing, so that my thoughts and stories might help improve someone else’s life condition or raise the collective vibration.
And taking medicine.
And I’m also doing it hoping that someone, anyone, might read it and give me their approval.
On one hand, I feel like I’m fulfilling my life purpose. Like I’m here doing what I was put on this earth to do. That I’m using my natural talents and skills to contribute to the collective. That I’m building something of value. And on the other hand, I feel like I’m trapped in the psychotic loop again. Am I just caught in the spiral?
Spiritually guided and gifted, or mentally ill and delusional?
Maybe a touch of both.
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