°16th of July 2022.
Pain comes in various forms.
First I noticed feeling frustrated,
then thoughts of failure,
then anxiety, my good old friend.
Then all of a sudden my gums started hurting,
and eventually my left hip,
well she wasn't to happy with me either.
It's too much.
It's overwhelm.
Overwhelmed with thoughts, feelings
and the inner waves of turmoil.
Scattered.
That's probably the best fit description,
there's countless pieces of me,
seemingly impossible to put back together.
It's the death of creativity,
this scattered state.
Every creative impuls
gets killed by overthinking,
by demanding perfection.
How did I get here?
I try to make the time-line,
and then I realise.
I've let the doubts sneak in,
seemingly innocent at first,
as if they're there to help me find
all the answers;
but in fact they're a pack of wolves
in sheepsclothing,
slowly tearing me apart,
one little piece of flesh at a time.
Nothing is certain.
Nothing is good.
No stone is left unturned
in my minds eye.
A state of endless agony, so they makes me believe.
My body is tensed from my forehead to my traps,
to my fingertips, all the way into my toes.
I can't help but sob and sigh.
Should I feel sorry for myself?
It would be easy at this point.
Then I remember,
the difference between pity
and com-passion.
To feel together. To carry the load together.
Not because I feel better than you (pity),
but because I feel with you.
I recognise pieces of myself in you.
Carrying them together,
cuts the load in half,
for the both of us.
When lacking com-passion,
judgmental voices multiply,
they get all the attention
(& only ad-tension).
Doubling the load.
So don't try to solve it all,
with thinking.
Sharp as a knife.
Deadly fast,
as the shark, recently seen,
nearby the mediterranean coast.
Beautiful, most definitely needed
and yet equally dangerous.
What do I really want?
I want to be able to express,
these scattered parts of Self.
Spread the inherent wisdom,
they have to share.
We put all these layers,
around our vulnerabilities.
And so if you're sensitive, like me,
that means thick coating,
by the age of 34.
You've convinced yourself,
that these layers,
make you "strong",
as we define it.
You've convinced yourself,
that you are your layers.
But in fact, they're not making you strong.
They're a fancy suit.
They feed the ego, sure.
They convince society, sure.
But they don't convince you, do they?
Arriving here abroad,
feels like a lifting of layers.
There literally just wasn't any room,
left in the car, to bring them.
And so, I didn't.
It's a relief,
aswel as it is terrifying.
It makes me feel lighter,
and heavier at the same time.
It makes me sad, and it makes me happy.
It makes me want to explore, yet hide.
It makes me want to skate over an obstacle,
yet tries to convince me to jump off the board.
The board gets the message even before I consciously do.
I 'think' I'm not responding to it, yet my body flinches,
and the board does exactly what I was afraid of.
The philosophical lessons of skateboarding.
But so, as these layers are stripped down;
as I stop wearing any make-up,
I stop making-up false selves.
Hence the arising doubts.
The unknown territory;
I walk, skate, stretch or swim into.
Am I safe here?
Am I going to be accepted here?
I have nothing else to offer really.
I'm done with make-beliefs.
It doesn't last, it's not true.
I make more space,
for all that encounters my path, inside and out.
It's there to help me grow.
It's there to lure my shadow parts,
out of the dark.
And deep down,
where the shark came from, I know,
I can't really fool myself anymore.
I've woken up.
I notice when my mind feeds me lies,
to 'protect me' from further harm.
I know, resistance is futile.
"The obstacle is the way",
so they say.
Feel,
& release.
You've got this.
You know you do.