During the last few weeks, I have suffered a period of pity-parties. In the past, I’d just don a white bathrobe and sit around moping until I got restless or until I got my confidence back, then it was out with the white robe and in with the fabulous renewal and the “get off my sac” attitude. Pretty potent stuff. It got to a point where I almost looked forward to my next pity-party because I knew what was coming afterward.
Part of this—lets call it a stage—part of this stage is due to the difficulty I had letting go. Just as I knew it would, there are prickles of guilt… passing whispers reminding me that when the going got tough, I ran for the hills, echoes in my mind saying I can’t do this, I can’t possibly continue and asking what I have now, to offer. Also very potent.
I recognize this as the aftershocks of lingering too long in places I shouldn’t have. There comes a point in every relationship, be it work, friendship, love or otherwise where you are influenced by what others see. You begin to accept what they know to be true in spite of what YOU know to be true. All of a sudden, ‘you can’t, you’re not capable, you aren’t able to, you need help, you’re not ready’. All of a sudden, there are limitations, boundaries and you discover, rather forcefully, that you are boxed in – enclosed in parameters that you did not set.
There’s no shame involved, because really, it happens to even the most vigilant of us, even those of us who are most protective of our personalities, who never stray far from their own true source. You move forward encased by these new limits in the belief that this is who you are. In the mirror, you see through the filtered walls of that box and begin to accept your NEW limitations one by one.
I did it or rather, it happened to me and I let it. I woke up every morning looking in the mirror and knowing and feeling powerless, trapped by circumstance, overwhelmed.
I’d like to say it was an ephiphany, a moment of crystalline thought pure as untouched snow that saved me, or that I mustered the energy and determination to break out on my own, but that would be false. It was anger; good old fashioned rage and later resentment that turned my insides cold as ice and my outsides vengeful and (figuratively) bloodthirsty. When I made my decision and finally walked away I felt calm(er) and I knew I’d made the right choice.
Now, how do I explain what happened next? I tried to move on too soon and opportunity poured through the holes in my confidence like water through a sieve and it didn’t help matters. I moved too soon. I tried to keep going but it was hard and I was tired, so I simply stopped. I shut down for weeks.
Sloth is addictive in an insidious way. I never actually saw it coming. Shut down, go out as little as possible, talk as little as possible, eat, sleep, wake up, do nothing. Its like a tunnel with no beginning and no end, just a numb abyss and for those few weeks, it was divine. I realized I was tired of feeling, doubting, still operating in those parameters put around me, existing like a caged wild animal that doesn’t know it’s free.
Yesterday, somewhere within my haze, there was a shadow of a thought, a sentiment that once I focused on it seemed to grow increasingly louder, stronger. And then doubt again, fear of failure again. The sentiment that grew into a thought became smaller, more distant and it went like that for a full 24 hours, I even dreamt of it – crashing on the beach of my consciousness like a wave upon the shore and slipping away again before I could scoop up even a cup full.
I woke up this morning and took a drive. Deji was still sleeping, curled up like child who’s been allowed to slumber on his parents bed 'just-this-once' after a week of sleeping on his own; innocent and untroubled by waking thoughts or the worries of tomorrow.
The drive did little to clear my head but I did return with one solid idea amidst the fuzz. Enough is enough, if it requires drastic measures, be unafraid to take them – and so, from today, I am. I’m curious to see how this pans out.
Most often, we believe that what happens to us is who we are, what we're worth. I'm betting my life on the belief that this isn't true.
Stay tuned.
Sunday, March 27, 2011
Thursday, March 24, 2011
Precipice
Its been ages. Too long.
Since I last signed on, I gained a few people and lost a few people (thankfully). I’ve also gained a few pounds that refuse to leave, but alas, such is living.
Its March 24th 2011. I’m sitting in a small dusty library in the Faculty of Arts on the campus of the University of Ibadan. I’m waiting for my e-textbook to load. As I watch that green line grow closer and ever so slightly closer to the end, I can’t help but examine the parallels in my life. Waiting. Waiting on things beyond my control, out of my grasp and how that waiting has spiraled into the uncanny acceptance of do-nothingness. It’s affecting me.
I filed for a fiancé visa for my brand spanking new fiancé in October of 2010. Up until now, I’ve heard nothing. The optimist in me keeps checking for updates the pessimist rejoices sadistically when I see “Initial Review” – no change in status for the last 5 months. And here I am, waiting.
I quit my job which at the time felt like severing my legs. It wasn’t that I enjoyed it immensely, it wasn’t that I felt it was a worthy cause that I must continue and it wasn’t because I felt like I couldn’t or wouldn’t do the work… it, the whole thing just wasn’t working. I was tired, run down, fed up and frustrated. It was like I treadmill I couldn’t vacate. Even when I left the office at night, I had something akin to that uncomfortable tingling sensation, that nagging feeling that I was still running on a faux tarred road, powered by electricity. I’d actually known for a long time that I’d wanted to leave, but I have such a hard time letting go.
At the time also, I had a friend, an advisor of sorts who became much more and much less. I listened and I believed where I shouldn’t have because in truth, it was one of those relationships that you know will end before it starts. I liked letting myself be talked into things, and I hated letting go even though I wanted to. Eventually, letting go became no problem at all and with that realization came that feeling of lightness, a burden being lifted.
It’s like trying to swim to the surface of the ocean while dragging a ton of bricks with you in a sack. You don’t particularly want or need the sack or its contents, but there’s a nagging sense that if you let it go, you’d have failed in some small irrevocable way--that will gnaw at you long after you're safe on dry land-- maybe forever. So, you claw and claw until you’re so tired you don’t know if you’ll make it and it doesn’t immediately occur to you let the sack go—but then, you have to make a choice. You break the surface and draw in air, or die trying to save yourself and the sack.
Well, I let it go and swam to the surface without looking back to see where it sank.
But here I am now, again, on the edge of a precipice, a beginning and there is nothing to do but glide into the sky or free fall. I look out toward our future and pray every step of the way. Mostly though, I’m excited. I can be now, whoever I want, wherever I want and so can he. My fiancé and I have the opportunity to pick and choose where we live and who we will become once we get there. It’s an exciting time to be us and to a time to choose carefully, wisely.
Also, I’ve done something I’ve always wanted to – started a business (hopefully, the first of many). I’m eager to learn and live. I’m eager to see what happens next.
Since I last signed on, I gained a few people and lost a few people (thankfully). I’ve also gained a few pounds that refuse to leave, but alas, such is living.
Its March 24th 2011. I’m sitting in a small dusty library in the Faculty of Arts on the campus of the University of Ibadan. I’m waiting for my e-textbook to load. As I watch that green line grow closer and ever so slightly closer to the end, I can’t help but examine the parallels in my life. Waiting. Waiting on things beyond my control, out of my grasp and how that waiting has spiraled into the uncanny acceptance of do-nothingness. It’s affecting me.
I filed for a fiancé visa for my brand spanking new fiancé in October of 2010. Up until now, I’ve heard nothing. The optimist in me keeps checking for updates the pessimist rejoices sadistically when I see “Initial Review” – no change in status for the last 5 months. And here I am, waiting.
I quit my job which at the time felt like severing my legs. It wasn’t that I enjoyed it immensely, it wasn’t that I felt it was a worthy cause that I must continue and it wasn’t because I felt like I couldn’t or wouldn’t do the work… it, the whole thing just wasn’t working. I was tired, run down, fed up and frustrated. It was like I treadmill I couldn’t vacate. Even when I left the office at night, I had something akin to that uncomfortable tingling sensation, that nagging feeling that I was still running on a faux tarred road, powered by electricity. I’d actually known for a long time that I’d wanted to leave, but I have such a hard time letting go.
At the time also, I had a friend, an advisor of sorts who became much more and much less. I listened and I believed where I shouldn’t have because in truth, it was one of those relationships that you know will end before it starts. I liked letting myself be talked into things, and I hated letting go even though I wanted to. Eventually, letting go became no problem at all and with that realization came that feeling of lightness, a burden being lifted.
It’s like trying to swim to the surface of the ocean while dragging a ton of bricks with you in a sack. You don’t particularly want or need the sack or its contents, but there’s a nagging sense that if you let it go, you’d have failed in some small irrevocable way--that will gnaw at you long after you're safe on dry land-- maybe forever. So, you claw and claw until you’re so tired you don’t know if you’ll make it and it doesn’t immediately occur to you let the sack go—but then, you have to make a choice. You break the surface and draw in air, or die trying to save yourself and the sack.
Well, I let it go and swam to the surface without looking back to see where it sank.
But here I am now, again, on the edge of a precipice, a beginning and there is nothing to do but glide into the sky or free fall. I look out toward our future and pray every step of the way. Mostly though, I’m excited. I can be now, whoever I want, wherever I want and so can he. My fiancé and I have the opportunity to pick and choose where we live and who we will become once we get there. It’s an exciting time to be us and to a time to choose carefully, wisely.
Also, I’ve done something I’ve always wanted to – started a business (hopefully, the first of many). I’m eager to learn and live. I’m eager to see what happens next.
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