Spinning Wheels
Currently reading:
Murder Bimbo by Rebecca Novack
Out There Screaming, edited by Jordan Peele
An American Sunrise by Joy Harjo
In Defense of Dabbling by Karen Walrond [audiobook]
Books finished this week: 0
Library updates:
I’m going to be so honest with all of you, I felt very mentally unwell this week. I can point to a few different factors——work is overwhelming and stressful; the world is shit; I haven’t been writing or reading as much as I need to, to stay sane——but I don’t know what, exactly, is wrong with my brain or my body this time around. I assume I’ll never really know. I just felt really weird and off most of the time for the last seven days.
I felt a little like I was spinning my wheels, trying to gain traction and move forward and push through, and, damn, but it was not working. I managed to be productive in some ways——sending work emails, cleaning parts of my apartment——but struggled in others, and I couldn’t figure out what I wanted to needed to feel better. To talk to people? To be home? To be out in the world? Fresh air? I tried a little bit of each of them and nothing felt quite right. There were bright spots, to be sure, but even when I was moving, I still felt a little stuck.
I pulled a tarot card yesterday, Saturday, for the first time in over a month, because I really needed some kind of guidance. I pulled the Hanged Man reversed. Now, the teacher I learned from doesn’t do reversals; she relies more on a sense of “upper” versus “lower” energies. But, boy, did this feel like a lower energy: feeling stuck, unsure, anxious, and unable to let things go and let myself move on and feel better.
I’m trying to embrace the “go with the flow” and “get a new perspective” energy of the Hanged Man as I head into the new week, and to not be so hard on myself when I don’t feel that way. I’m trying not to get frustrated when I don’t know what the fuck I want or need, but to instead let myself sit with the confusion and think on it and untangle the emotions. I would very much like to let things roll off my back and to let myself surrender to the universe, as Mr. Hanged Man dictates.
Sorry this is a more personal one than usual (and that I really don’t have anything to say about books at all), but I let out a lot of shit in my journal and I have therapy tomorrow night, and I figured, in the meantime, I’d let some of it spill into the more public forum of my blog. It’s been awhile since I felt this weird, and it’s a little scary. It feels like backsliding into a headspace I don’t want to be in. But I’m also working on telling myself that this is okay, that mental health isn’t linear and ever upward; it’s a fucking loop-de-loop of messy feelings and random triggers and hard work, and sometimes you need to go backward to dig out from under some shit and be nice to yourself while you figure out how to get unstuck from the mud.
I’m sorry if you’re feeling stuck, too! Just know that you’re not alone.
Closing thoughts:
Let go and let god (or your deity/spiritual guide of choice).
