Sometimes I dream about having more time to do all these things I don't get to do on a regular basis like... doing nothing, sleeping a lot, watching TV, listening to music days long, going for a walk, shopping for pleasure and not just for necessities of life, chatting with my friends, getting drunk, reading fiction, writing emails to my friends, adding new pictures to my site, writing a story or a poem, writing an intelligent, thoughtful blog post, maybe even cleaning up my closets... I could go on, and on, and on here but that would only get more and more bizarre, including things I don't even really want to do or would be very improper to do...
I have this long to-do list in my mind all the time, the top 10 shifts from time to time so I cannot even set the priorities and this may be a huge problem. When I finally do have some time, I find it very hard to figure out what I should do in the first place and end up feeling miserable that I cannot do them all. Still, even when my classes are over, there is enough in my life to keep me occupied and not let me do everything! Slowly put a check mark by all of them. So comforting. So impossible. I'm lucky if I get to go through the third of my list. And I'm so tired at the end of my break... And often miserable... I don't understand. I think I'd love to have more time and feel exhausted and overwhelmed when all the things pile up on me and suffocate me but when I get a break from some of them I cannot do anything constructive and I realize I do enjoy having so much to do that it prevents me from wasting my time on things like TV or shopping for things I can do without or keeping my closets in perfect order. Is it workaholism or rather studyholism? Is it that I truly lost the capacity for resting, have I become a "do, achieve, conquer, and the like" junkie? I like the rush of things around me, it makes me feel alive, makes me move, progress, learn, grow... And it also helps forget about the things you want to select and delete but you don't own the computer it's saved on... It helps go on even when you'd much rather sit and cry, stop and give up. I can only hope that's not the main motivation here. That would mean it's much worse than I thought.
6 comments:
"I like the rush of things around me, it makes me feel alive, makes me move, progress, learn, grow... [...] It helps go on even when you'd much rather sit and cry, stop and give up." I don't know if I can add anything to that.
Reading yr recent posts, Ewuś, all I can think of is this; your life as it is right now is your choice. Were you forced to marry, have children, move to the USA, take on the responsibilities of study, wifehood, parenthood? And if some magic delete key removed any of those things from your life, wouldn't the emptiness you felt be a black hole sucking you in and destroying you?
Right now I have material comfort on a level I've hardly known since leaving home, but the absence of a person to share with, grow with, and grow old with is increasingly troubling to me. To be with such a person, of course, means making compromises and sacrifices, losing some of the freedom & wealth I have. But the gains in another kind of riches would be incalculable.
Isn't this just a way for both of us to say 'the grass is always greener on the other side of the Atlantic'? ;)
I would never want these things to disappear from my life. These are the best things that have ever happened to me! I don't write explicitly what I want out - that's not what I would dare to do in a blog. Remember that I'm emotionally unstable sometimes, especially when I listen to some music that manages to touch this one cord, one emotion that will then blow up out of proportion... and if it finds an expression somewhere it's in my writing - it often takes me to places I wouldn't think I'd go.
And one more thing - even when you enjoy your responsibilities, even if it was your choice to welcome them in your life because you felt they would make it so much richer and better, it doesn't mean that it's easy. It doesn't mean that you don't have a day when you simply feel exhausted and sick and unable to fight whatever stands in your way to conquer this time. There are so many things to deal with when you have kids and a spouse and all of them often very emotional that it doesn't compare to just being overworked. It eats at your soul if you cannot make some things better, if you cannot help your own child, or if you feel you've neglected something again because you were too busy, too tired... It makes you question everything but then you get up and find strength and realize that without all the things you do for yourself, the time you take away from your family, it'd be even worse because you'd be miserable and resentful. So it's a constant struggle for this balance and a dose of selfishness - enough to have some space and not enough to isolate yourself. But sometimes I do allow myself to be submerged into my wild emotions on the border of feeling but not that corporally sensuous, just a sea of gentle touches, sounds, breathes... I let myself be carried by these waves into sweet elation, sadness, fury, passion - all these feelings that are so harmless when they have no real source, no real pain or happiness attached, pure and raw. Then I rest. I don't know if I make much sense here.
It's time for a sweeping generalisation! Sit back and make yourself comfortable... ;)
How about this? My response as a man to the accumulation of stresses, contradictions and emotions which daily life brings about is to _do_ something about it, change, co-ordinate, be pro-active, generally muck about and disturb what might actually be a real equilibrium.
Yours as a woman is different; you don't necessarily _need_ to alter or remove the elements of your life - you just need to vent, to release the pressure in the manner of steam from one of those pressure-cooker pots our mothers cooked with. Meanwhile, the stew of your life remains tasty! Whereas I wd throw away half of the ingredients. ;)
Reasonable? Greetings from wet Warsaw :)
Do you realize how much I hate generalizations? And especially about men and women? You certainly managed to sweep me off my feet... I should have listened and sit down. But if generalizations you ask for, generalizations you'll going to get... I call your male tactics 'escape' and female ones 'dealing with what you have on your plate'. How about that? Seriously, I think the flee or fight instinct still runs deep in all of us... And believe me, you wouldn't want to eat one of my stews... Hardly delicious!
I'm going to stick my nose in your conversation for a moment and add to your analogy...
When the messy pot of stew is so overcooked and in a rolling boil, my feeling is that what you need to do(whether you are a man or woman)is turn off the burner and put the pot aside.
Then, take out a fresh pan and cook something that you -- and only you -- love. It should be unusual and a treat. Let that feed your soul for a while.
Then, the next day, reheat the big pot of stew and let it simmer slowly. You will find that stew is always more palatable the next day.
xoxo
Now, that's the kind of reasoning that I like - intriguing and inspiring. And a little dangerous! Love it.
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