As the year comes to an end, I can’t help but start to analyze what 2018 held for me.

If I’m being honest, I haven’t felt like myself lately. I don’t even know who myself is anymore. I thought I had a clear picture, but as many times as I try to pick up the things I used to love, I don’t feel the same connection anymore. I feel lost as hell.

In Asheville, I felt at home. I was this perfect little mix of putting myself out there whilst getting back to my roots. Everything felt right there and since I’ve been home, I haven’t felt the same.

For a week straight, I found myself in this state of awe over life.

I was looking at the leaves falling, the stars in the sky, looking at my job with a new sense of purpose, and so on. I had found a new appreciation for my everyday life, but as the days have dwindled on this week, I’m confused yet again.

I’ve been in a pretty dark place for days. I’ve been spaced out without a care for anything at all.

I’ve been late to work, looking for validation, going out to bars to keep a sense of normal yet all I feel is numb. I went out last night after a day of on-and-off tears because I thought it would make me feel better when all anyone could see is how off I was.

I’ve felt off since Tuesday this week and I’ve been searching for relief since, but not in the healthiest of ways.

I didn’t turn to alcohol as much which was good, but instead, I was broadcasting how shitty I felt.

I mean, this is no surprise giving the content of this blog and my social media, but something about my outcries felt different. I wasn’t posting to connect or make anyone feel better, I was looking for someone to pull me aside and tell me everything is going to be okay. I needed someone to tell me and when no one really did, it only further perpetuated the wound.

As humans, we want to feel a sense of belonging. We crave intimacy with one another, so when people don’t meet your expectations or turn the other way, it leaves you feeling even more disconnected.

It’s taken me nearly a year to realize this, but I see now how hard it is for me to be completely alone. It’s surprising given the past few introspective years of my life, but thing is, I’ve always had attachments in my head.

 

Even when I’ve been alone externally, I had on-going attachments to friendships or the men in my life internally. I didn’t realize it because I was constantly jumping from one attachment to the next.

 

I’ve thought all along that I was this independent gal and I didn’t need other people; turns out, it’s not that I didn’t need others, I didn’t believe I could have them.

When one friendship fizzled out, I replaced that person with someone else.

When I came to my senses about men that weren’t good for me, I would find new guys to put all of my energy into.

I didn’t get over the guy from last year until I met someone new.

When this new person left me life, it was merely weeks before I found myself in my next attachment.

It’s frustrating as hell because I want to believe I can move on from people in my life without having a new person come in to take their place. I want to believe I can start doing things for myself again without the cloud of someone else in my rear view.

I recognize the pattern and at the very least, I’m grateful for that. I, however, don’t know where to go from here. It makes sense why my life seems to be a series of repeated events though.

 

Even when I thought things were different, they never were, and that’s been the most painful pill to swallow.

 

Yet at the same time, I feel comforted to know that I’m not so much attached to people as I am to the idea of attaching.

Reading that back, I also feel a little sad.

 

Am I so self-focused that I can’t even look at people as individuals, but characters in the story of my life? Have I been creating ideas about the people in my life rather than seeing them for who they are?

 

I’m in my head often enough that I sometimes don’t feel as connected to those around me. I look to find meaning in events and people rather than taking everything at face value. It makes for a great level of self-awareness, but a restricted sense of living.

Harsh, but true.

I keep myself at a distance from others enough that they think they know my quirks, but there are layers that I still struggle to reach.

If I could boil down my biggest pain in life, it would my lack to connect.

I have a surface-layer to my personality that keeps me safe; she jokes, self-deprecates for days, and hardly takes life too seriously. It’s this version of myself that garners me the most approval.

So, when I try to bring my introspective side outward, I never know what reaction I am going to be met with. I let it out briefly with those I meet and if I’m met with any backlash, I tend to revert back to my ‘safe’ personality.

This is why I can’t get close to people.

They grow to like my surface-layer and I become terrified if I steer too far from that, they won’t want to deal with the deeper aspects of me.

I write these blog posts and share honest words on my social media because I can let this side of me out without dealing with any backlash. I realize that only those who truly care for me would dive further in to this side of me. As for everyone else, they can know me as the self-deprecating girl who laughs too hard at her own jokes.

 

I’d love to believe I can merge the two, but truth is, I don’t see a need to.

 

As we all travel along our own paths, we don’t need to be met with constant hard realizations all the time. Sometimes, we simply want to laugh and enjoy life. Our surface-layer personalities are as much a part of us as our deeper aspects.

I like the personality I project to the world and more often than not, the world could use a lot more laughs. It feels good to provide that relief for other people.

My issue begins with believing that side of me is where my value lies. I stopped trusting that people truly cared about me a long time ago. I’ve seen myself as comic relief for so long that the moment I get closer to anyone, I tend to ruin it before anything can grow. I close up and struggle to share intimate feelings of any kind despite how easy it is for me to share on here.

And for this reason, I keep people in my life that won’t try to cross those barriers.

In my mind, I am safe because no one is forcing anything out of me, but I feel a sense of depletion.

This has to be why I started writing in the first place. I’ve spent almost all of my relationships not feeling heard, so I decided to put myself out there and see who latched.

The more I think about it, the people I see constantly in my life don’t read these posts. I post about how I write and I share snippets from time to time, but no one ever asks me about it. It’s become an elephant in the room.

I’m drained to say the least.

I’m in a push-and-pull of knowing where my bad habits lie, but not knowing where to go from here.

I suppose admitting where you’ve gone wrong is the first step; yet, without any more clarity to spare, I feel trapped.

Trapped in my patterns, my mind.

 

Our lives all begin and end with thought, but what do you do when no thought feels any better than another? What do you do when no direction seems promising?

 

That’s where I’ve been lately.

I’m surrounded by people, but truthfully have never felt more disconnected.

I’ve preached about how nonchalant I became this year and while no pressure feels good for a while, you reach a point where you’re tired of not giving a shit anymore. You want to feel a drive for something – anything.

 

I placed my energy in other people this year.

I stopped looking after myself in an assortment of ways.

I passed through life as if my days were endless.

 

I’m done with living a life of short-term gratification. I’m more than I’ve given myself credit for this year and if anything at all, I want to prove that I don’t have to live out the same stories. If I want to experience change, the only roadblock is my willingness to act accordingly.

 

We can allow life to happen and hinder us, or we can squarely decide that we won’t let ourselves be victims anymore.

 

If we see the ways we’ve been hurting ourselves, there is no reason to let yourself learn the hard way anymore. Make different choices. Stand up for yourself more. Take back that power you’ve told yourself was lost so long ago.

The only way to create a change is with action and intent – we need to act in ways that line up with the life we want to live.

It’s simple, but the most common-sense keys of life tend to go over our heads – mine, at least.

 

In truth, we’re never as stuck as we make ourselves out to be.

Our worlds crumble and we lose who we are at times, but we’re never trapped in where we are.

Growth is everlasting and while we don’t always see it, we find ourselves looking back seeing how different our lives became.

So while I am hurt, I am growing.

And that’s all I could ever ask.