MAZE

The interesting thing about being a writer is having so many ideas run through your mind at once. Isolated ideas quite capable of becoming an epistle individually but somehow your mind finds a way to make connections between these disjointed concepts and actualize meaning.

I am not sure writing is entirely about making meaning or storytelling, it is catharsis or cathartic whatever tickles your fancy but what I mean to say is sometimes as a writer you simply write because that is how you interpret living. I don’t know when I finally started identifying as a writer because for the longest time I figured writing was about showmanship. You know, I have a book, I won an award, I am a creative writer… while there is nothing wrong with this, it is enough to simply write, just to practice using one’s voice on paper.

Let me not get carried away. I am not here to brag about resolving my identity crisis as a writer I think that was warm up to allow my mind to wander to what it is trying to convey. Okay, I have finally figured something out but I am not sure I am brave enough to share it in the way that I felt it maybe I’ll be able to hide in plain sight while bringing relief to my tussled mind.

This is like a sequel to my piece on broken borrowed people without all the enlightenment and the sage resolution. It sucks to always meet a memory block when you are trying to connect with a person. A reminder that someone else was here before you took ownership, and staked their claim. It almost feels like a competition only that you cannot outdo the other person. First, because you can never be them and second, they already have one on you, they called dibs. So why do we still feel the need to compete with their memory or is it just me?

That’s all I am going to say about that.

Do you ever find yourself about to disintegrate from the panic of not knowing what to do with your life? I mean you can picture all the various ways your life can improve but you are very shortsighted about the navigation of where you are to where you want to be. Is insight the powerful thing or grit? Is it enough to know where you want to go or is it better to have the drive to go wherever?

Why do we find a way to take on negativity? I mean it is so easy to internalize bullshit (pardon my language but there is no better way to phrase this) If I say toxicity it wouldn’t do justice because not everything is toxic even when we view it as such but bullshit is bullshit any day. What I am driving at is why is it easier to believe that negative things will happen instead of positive things even when we are positive people. It is easier to absolve all the bad things happening in the world and use that as a metric for how cold and ruthless a place the world can be losing sight of all the pleasantness.

Practice gratitude. This seems like holistic advice that encompasses the instruction but no one talks about how to acknowledge the pain while being grateful for the lessons yet, being able to say I wish I didn’t have to learn all that. I am just starting to learn the need for this distinction.

I had to mute a person’s status on IG the other day because for some reason I could never quite make out if I was envious of this person or in admiration, but one thing was certain, I had some sort of anxiety whenever I viewed this person status as though I were automatically failing at life just by watching them live theirs. The thing is, I am not even sure I want to live their life but I think watching them live speaks to my insecurities and the very things I have not found ways around. Is this weakness or preserving one’s mental health? does it matter when the underlying issue here is that competition with another person is quite a futile endeavor?

I don’t think I am a patient person. Working on this but is it still patience if I want a timeline on when the lessons will be over?

Someone once told me : “to have a good life, you must be willing to accept failure” not in these words precisely, more in the direction of learning to adapt failure as a part of success and the necessary ingredient for a rounded happy journey. Another person says : “we should learn to go with the tide instead of against it” more like surrender the need for control. What is the balance between ambition and complacence? Is there a guide on how not to feel like a failure in the middle of an equation that is not adding up and you are smart enough to see that but not enough to fix it?

Battling insecurities… This is one everlasting battle because it seems like layers and layers of unending discoveries attached to a person called you that you have not even figured out. I don’t think we overcome insecurities, I think we battle them, and like in war, you lose some and you gain some.

Have you ever felt an overwhelming sense of peace amid the chaos? like on the minute you are hyperventilating about the various ways your life seems to be or can crumble and the next you can just see yourself on the other side of the eruption and you just see the whole picture that you’d overcome somehow even though you are not sure how?

I have a friend I cannot let go of. I don’t think we are still friends at least not in the ways that friendship matters to me. I just can’t find it in me to not check up on this friend and they can’t find it in them to check up on me. Yeah, we can’t seem to resolve this conflicting interest.

I was talking to a friend the other day about how social media and an online presence can make you feel like you have an interesting life when in reality you are not even participating in your life. You are just watching other people watch you live your life that is not your actual life. I hope you get what I am trying to say…

You are sad but you use happy emojis. You can edit your physical insecurities, you can take on a new personality, communicate with people without being present, and hide in plain sight. Stalk your ex, obsess over your crush. Everything is instant messaging, you have anxiety over talking on the phone. you can’t even exist in boredom because you’d be interrupted by a funny meme or a hilarious Tiktok video. Almost like the mundane shouldn’t exist… as you must always live life from one curated event to the other. I admire people who don’t have this problem but this is a raging addiction.

I like snow. I am not sure I feel the same about the cold. Can’t I have snow with summer vibes? I think this is how we sound when we want to love a perfect person. It is like saying we like them but we wish to edit their properties. Yeah, humans are complex to love but it is what it is.

This write up is dedicated to a person who said to me : “I wish I can see what goes on in that head of yours.”

Here is an example and this is not even 24 hours’ worth. I hope this makes you happy.

Now let me go think about world hunger and of course what I am doing with my life.

Xoxo…