Someone I love once told me they were afraid of losing themself. The complete depletion of who you are feels like a nightmare. I think the loss of yourself happens by getting absorbed into a black hole. I catch myself thinking to myself often could that ever happen to me? Is it happening to me right now? Am I slipping into a skin that was never mine to begin with?
I am an obsessive person which, consequently, makes me direct. It allows me to push right into the center of the meat and pummel forward. So often, what seems to be an action or a thought that sprung out on a whim, is a carefully crafted sentiment I have been mulling over for hours for days for months for years. In short: I am careful (at least I try to be). I think about it all a lot then perform what I have been wanting quickly. I think that is called balance (or mania)
I do not want to be consumed flippantly. I don’t want to find myself in an unrecognizable form. I want to remember who I am, what I love, and all the people who continue to engage in meaningful exchanges. I don’t want to feel so subsumed in the type of dribble that when people hear you blab about it they all go "….huh?”
Not to be totally cliche but New York is difficult. It is a place where the corner you inhabit feels like the entire universe. It is where the misuse of language for your own benefit can make you perceived as heroic when the backdrop of it all is closer to demonic. I have grown into and out of various industries and social circles in my short 11 years here. Every time I approach the ledge of letting any person or place define me, I turn around. I force myself to jut back into reality. I expand my scope beyond what has been comfortably near my fingertips.
I remember the world is big. I remember life is long. I remember it’s ok to try your best then be misunderstood.
When I felt a pang of frustration, I opened up my notebook to a page that reads nothing is ever worth everything. I wrote it down while on shrooms. I am thinking about that day- how the leaves’ edges were glowing gold against the sky. How I didn’t look at my phone for hours so, instead, I used my hands to hold the faces and shoulders of the people sitting in mismatched chairs across the backyard. I felt fleeting, flying, and completely still. Like, sure! That is because… I was on fucking DRUGS. But it is how I want to dedicate myself to feeling more often- less tethered to meaningless shit, more invested in who I chose to be around me.
My friend Mary Kate recently told me “you and me- we need to be brave”
In these past few months, I have been brave enough to know when to say when, to go wherever I want to go, to create for creating sake, for learning new skills, for saying who I am and who I want to be with my full heart, and finally finding ways to pull my limbs out the mouth of any person, place, or thing that seems to be trying to swallow me whole.