OT: Restlessness...(longish)
Restlessness…
This is my second post today and you will note that it is decidedly different from my first post, which is intentional. The first post reflects something of my continuing appreciation for being healthier than I have been in many years, arguably the intellectual product of a relatively normal, rational mind. What follows reflects another part of me, one that somehow co-exists with being rational most of the time. Some will think that it is the product of someone who is troubled, someone who needs professional help. Maybe that is so, but my New Year’s resolution this year is to embrace this other part of me even if it leaves me howling at the moon, tattered and alone…….
It visits me in the night when I should be sleeping. It hounds me at work while I should be doing something productive. People sometimes wonder if I am bored with them when the feeling is strongest and I am distracted by it. While I can usually keep it at bay while I am exercising, it really never goes away; it just lies there, waiting to insinuate itself into my thoughts again. The best way I can describe it is a feeling of perpetual restlessness, a near-compulsion to move physically and to move on emotionally from anything and anyone that I perceive to be detracting from my sense of well-being. I don’t really care about my job at the company where I have worked for 25+ years. I don’t care about keeping my house, nor do I want anything bigger or better. I am confused about what I want in my personal relationships, with the exception of my kids, whose happiness is paramount to me. At first I thought it was depression rearing its ugly head again, but it’s not that, even from the perspective of the mental health professional I have been seeing. What I want, you see, is a greater sense of inner peace, a state of mind that I will have to actively seek; it won’t work to simply wish for it….I will need to be proactive in what I do for myself physically and emotionally. I am worried that being proactive in those ways will make me selfish, rather than self-focused as I mean to be. Others will be the judge of that I guess.
You might laugh, but I have actually thought about becoming a hermit, shut off from the world at large, protected from its hurts while paying the price in loneliness. I am convinced that the answer and resolution to this restlessness lies somewhere between what my life has been to date and becoming a hermit. I find myself moving slowly in that direction, testing the waters as it were, to see if the restlessness recedes at all as I begin to pull away from the familiar. In some ways I feel like I am approaching the top of a treacherous peak and the ride down will either be exhilarating or a freefall into insanity. Either might be preferable to this unrelenting restlessness and the guilt I feel for wanting change to what is otherwise a very good life. Yet I feel hopeful, that I will find my way if I keep at it, if I don’t shy away from the deep-seated fear I have of destroying my life and the lives of the people around me. Hope sustains me and keeps me steadfast in my pursuit of that elusive inner peace.
RP
I think you need to take stand and just take action. It might not work out the way you want or expected.... but it'll be better than being still and not happy.
