The Process of Processing

Can't Help Myself

My desire to write right now feels really hard to wrangle, and then, suddenly, appears out of nowhere in my net, ready to surrender. I am trying to get a more consistent sleep schedule together, and cutting caffeine at the same time which means that I am tired almost constantly. My brain feels unfocused, my schedule is unmoored and I am trying my best to not carry around a deep disappointment that feels akin to a boulder. 

I don’t write fiction (ever) but I woke up a few days ago with the first couple of pages of a space story floating around my brain. It felt relentless and unwilling to let me press snooze, so I got out of bed with my eyes mired with the remnants of sleep and I threw on the clothes closest to me. I fumbled my way to give in to writing it down, picking up my laptop in transit from my bed to the couch. I wrote a few pages of the most nihilistic shit I’ve ever written, and then fell back asleep on the couch for the most gratifying sleep I’ve had in a long, long time. 

I am actively resisting the urge to feel like everything I’m doing is incorrect and in need of fixing. By “resisting the urge” I mean fighting back against it with all my might and talking about it constantly to anyone who is willing to listen. 

I feel like I am leaching my worries and insecurities in a purification process that feels almost sticky. I keep a bottle of hand sanitizer in my car because I hate the smell of metal on skin and every time I have to handle keys it bothers me. These two things feel alike. Sometimes I feel like I can’t help myself and other times I feel like I just need to get off of Instagram and cast off the to-do list that’s strangling me. Most of the time if I go outside to walk around a pond or lay on a blanket and bake in the sun I feel like a new woman.

A few weeks ago I tried to make my way through a 140 page book and each time I sat down to read I struggled to stick with it for long enough to make any progress. That was how I knew my attention space was shot. To remedy this I have been setting alarms for 25 minutes at a time and dedicating myself fully to a task. I told one of my consulting clients that it feels like I am a puppy in training, but it is working. My screen time is way down, my mind feels quieter, and I feel like I’m not in a constant state of needing to glitch from one task to another. Now I can read for long stretches and not worry about what emails are coming in or who might be needing me.

On Sunday I cried because I wanted and needed to garden but it felt so indescribably hard to make myself get dressed to do it that I wanted to go back to sleep. Instead of fighting the tears I just let myself cry. I let my husband hold me while I told him all of the things that were floating around my head and how bad they were making me feel. I sobbed and sobbed and when I was done I got up and got dressed in a linen shirt, long pants, garden clogs, a bandana and straw hat— the perfect gardener’s outfit. No point of the process felt easier, but I did it. I gave the garden 100% of my effort which looked like 40% of what I’d have liked to give it. When I was done I was sweaty, mosquito bitten and glad to have done some work. I was totally exhausted from the vulnerability and the manual labor. I came inside and read the entirety of Thirst by Marina Yuszczuk.

I think I am in the process of processing. 

Everything feels within my grasp. Time feels stretchy, which is both welcomed and overwhelming. I feel firmly here, and hellbent on the lifelong dance of understanding myself more completely.

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