Well apparently I am at THIS part of my cycle again.

I have been feeling very restless for the last two days. It’s a painful sensation when it is not acted upon. In the past, not knowing what it was, I thought it was part of the usual torments of depression.

The really painful part. The worst part, even.

Because in my ignorance of the cause of this pain, it seemed to me like was just sitting peacefully at my comnputer doing whatever and then suddenly this howling screaming inner pain wracked me and scared the heck out of me…. out of nowhere!

So I did what all dysthymic depressives do in reaction to pain : I froze up. My type of depression interprets the basic problem of depressin – an adrenal response that is stuck in the “on” position because of unresolved trauma(e) – as meaning “it is time to hide and be very still until the predator goes away”/.

In other words. it’s the “hide” part of adrenaline’s fight/flight/hide potential.

In the abovementioned situation, of course, freezing up is the exact opposite of what I should be doing in response to the pain of restlessness.

I know this now. And that helps. \

But the pain persists because there is stil a lot of freezer-burned psychological scar tissue any urge to act has to push through in order to move me to actual action.

And that…. hurts.

But unlike in the past. I view this pain as a good thing because it means an important part of me is trying hard to wake up and that’s something I really want to happen.

It’s like rays of the sun have warmed the earth within me enough to signal the seed of my id that it is time to push it tendrils through the semi-frozen earth above it until it break through the frosty surface and can, at last. after the long long winter,. feel the light and warmth of the sun and grow tall and strong for all to see its beautiful flowers.

In other words. I’m a late bloomer. But better late than never.

To continue the metaphor (because at this point, I might as well), in these early stages of growth, those tender buds of May (my birth month) have to be carefully nurtured and given room to grow unmolested if they are to make it to the sunlight.

So once more I am doing my best to let the restlessness do its ob and wake me up inside and lead me to joyous and purposeful action.

It’s just going to hurt like heck first.

But I can feel it working. I can feel my usual state of being frozen stiff and unable to step outside my teeny tiny comfort zone melting away from my id’s long dormant fires.

All I have to do is get out of the way and let the process proceed. Pain is only pain, after all. It’s bad but it’s not the worst thing in the world.

The worst thing is being too dead inside to feel anything.

Pain at least reminds me that I am alive and real and present on Planet Earth. And I would rather be alive and in pain than dead and “content”.

Because I’m not content. Not at all. The voice screaming “THIS IS NOT ENOUGH!” inside me has a point.

This life of mine is not enough for me. I need more content in my life.  I want to truly be a part of things instead of being forever locked out of life in my tiny little cage.

That means throwing open the doors and letting life in. And that. in turn, requires me to learn to tolerate not always knowing what is going to happen or where this all is going.

And the only way to learn that is practice, practice. practice.

Even thinking about it in a totally abstract way. like I am doing as I write this, fills me with the ice cold fear that has kept me from living life for 20 years. It’s like icy fingers wrapped around my heart and it freezes me in place.

I’m still waiting for that predator to leave, apparently.

Well fuck that. I am truly and deeply sick and tired of hiding in the bushes. So I’m going to go out there and either get eaten or go back to living.

Either way, at least it will be over.

This means my immediate goal is to practice overcoming that icy feeling instead of being trapped by it. I realize now that I have been letting my fears control me for a long time now by not doing a single thing to challenge them.

Hmm. There’s a story in there somewhere but now is not the time.

And why have I let them have their way with me? Because it’s easier. It doesn’t require much energy to maintain. And I have so little energy that I have to be very careful how I spend it so that I have enough for the essentials. Right ?

WRONG. That’s austerity thinking and it does not work.  There is plenty of energy out there for the taking but you have to invest energy to claim it. That little seed of mine has to deplete its battery trying to get its shoots to the surface if it’s to get to all that wonderful sunlight up above.

And the thing about the life force in humans is that if you stop spending it,. the pathways shut down and your mind goes into austerity mode.

But the energy is there – it is within you and I – the depression just makes you too numb to feel it.

So because you don’t feel like you have the energy, you don’t do the things that would actually get you the energy to do still more things and so forth and so on until you end you day exhausted and content.

It’s like yuou have to pay life’s maintenance bill or they turn your power off.

Imagine how much being shut down like that will cost you.

Makes spending the energy the wiser choice, right?

So I am going to spend like a sailor and not worry about whether I will have enough energy for a “later” that never comes.

Winter is over. Spring has come.

It’s time for my garden to bloom.

I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.