So, I Asked Myself…

I have been having an exceptionally not-good time these past few weeks. I can chalk it up to an endless list of things, but at the end of the day, all of these things are not as ominous and terrifying as my anxiety is making them seem. Last year, when I was having an exceptionally not-good time, I retreated into a silent place and worked it all by myself. This was a bad idea; something I have written about profusely so as to not repeat the mistake.

So, yesterday, having read through old journal entries and letters and cards and the highlighted sections in my favourite books, I asked myself:
“Should I retreat into that silent place and work this all out by myself?”

And she said:
“No. Stay here, stay with me, stay with us, and keep doing what you’re doing and work it out the difficult way.”

And so, I asked myself: “Why take the difficult path when it’s so much easier to go back to bed?”

And she said: “I know you feel like you never intended to be in this world. But we know that this feeling is a facade. You’re standing here, with the mud mucking up between your toes. You’re in the world, the wind blowing back your hair. And you belong in it as much as it belongs to you.”

And so, I wiped the channels of tears running down my cheeks. I sorted away the old journal entries, the letters and cards, shelved my favourite books back into position, and I wrote:

Flowers push through Concrete cracks Blooming above cement They defy.

A lizard squirms out Of your grasp A trembling tail Soon replaced.

Forgotten houses are Overtaken by verdant lush Branched roof Carpeted fern

Look around, on the ground, and look close; there is life. Pushing forward Pushing through.

And so, I told myself,

I am here. And I am pushing through.