Before school ended for the summer, I found myself on a rooftop looking up at the stars. It was around one o’clock in the morning and I had been taking a break from studying. I needed the break, but it was hard to let myself relax with thoughts of unfinished school work bouncing around in my brain.
Before school ended for the summer, I found myself on a rooftop looking up at the stars.
It was around one o’clock in the morning and I had been taking a break from studying. I needed the break, but it was hard to let myself relax with thoughts of unfinished school work bouncing around in my brain. Not only was my mind racing, but my heart felt pretty heavy. The quiet was eye opening and suddenly I was achingly sad.
I realized after having a moment of quiet, a moment of still, that I was absolutely drained. A moment that was supposed to feel calming and peaceful was taken up with the epiphany that my brain just never stops running.
I am constantly worried about the next thing, constantly making comparisons, constantly thinking about other uses for my time, and constantly beating myself up for not working hard enough.
Not only do I have these thoughts about my own actions, but I constantly fret about the wants and needs of others rather than my own. It came to the point where I didn’t know if I was where I was by my own doing or if I thought it would make someone else happy.
I couldn’t help but wonder, do other people think like this?
I was desperate to feel what it is like to complete a task and not think about its perfection for hours after or to walk away from an interaction and not wonder what the other person thought every time I see them. I was desperate to know what it felt like when your mind slows down or even what an empty mind feels like. I wondered what it would feel like to care less about every little thing which is what seemed like many other people did. When I feel like this, my immediate response is to sit in silence. I did not think other people could feel what I feel and the last thing I would ever want to be is a burden on someone else. As I laid there thinking how I could possibly explain this feeling to someone else, I just decided not to. I have pushed a lot of people away because of this and what I used to ball into anger, I now bottle up within myself.
I feel like what is missing in this conversation is how the exhaustion of thinking can make one feel so lonely in the big picture. I have since found comfort in talking it out and realized how our minds can make us feel like the world is ending.
I also find lots of comfort in crying. I used to try to suck in the tears and not allow myself to let it out because I didn’t think I had enough reason to cry. I would think to myself how embarrassing it is that everyone else can handle these situations and I can’t. It might seem like I must have been out here for hours with the amount of thinking I was able to accomplish, however these spurts typically last no longer than five minutes.
I cried in frustration which is not uncommon for me and I reminded myself of the importance of these reflections and that a good cry every so often never hurt anyone.
