Day 13: Zendiggity

My funk has lifted and I have my hope and dreams all back in place where they belong. I knew it would pass, but after so many years of depression and anxiety, when a bad moment stretches into a bad day and then the bad day becomes two… there is an intense fear that wells up from the depths of my memory of all the hard times before. All the darkness, all the pain, all the loneliness. I begin to panic because I haven’t fulfilled my calling yet. I’m not even completely sure what my calling IS yet! But I know I haven’t done it and I’m not ready to go back to where I couldn’t do anything. It’s hard to pretend everything is fine when all of that is going on in your head.

So, in the whirlpool of negativity and fear, I start to judge myself. Instead of seeing things as they are, I match the tempo of my rushing panic and measure myself against the progress and success of everyone who has had years and decades of working toward their goals. Why haven’t I reached mine yet? How do I get there? What can I do? What can I study? Why aren’t things moving faster? The intense “hurry up and do something, anything, before the chance is gone again” mentality takes over; and, I’m just unable to measure up! I would assume it sort of feels like drowning: a struggle to breathe; knowing that the air is just so close, and yet not close enough to inhale; the anger and frustration that your limbs can’t fight the currents that are pulling you under; the exhaustion; and the fear. I’ve never drowned so I may have that all wrong, but that is the kind of panic that I experience. Of all the things I want in life, I want more than anything to never go back to the living death of before.

So, while I was only aware of all the ways I wasn’t good enough, and while I was fighting the panic of being doomed to my former non-existence, I kept seeing all the great news of others taking on big challenges and starting new adventures in their lives… People moving to new houses, people moving to new countries, people getting new jobs, and I’m feeling stuck and worthless (even though I know things are happening and I’m not worthless) and alone? Hence crying into my breakfast yesterday. Have you ever cried into a bowl of apples and caramel sauce? It’s a very surreal and pitiful moment. Then I blogged about it! But I gave myself permission to be miserable. I allowed myself to admit that I was hurting. And that was a little bit healing.

By yesterday afternoon, I’d made a new online friend because of my honesty. I went to the gym and hit a goal on leg presses. Let’s just say that the totally random song that shuffled onto my mp3 player was 5 minutes long… I couldn’t feel my legs by the time it was done, but my spirit was soaring because last week I’d wanted to press during a whole song without taking a break and couldn’t make it. My spirit soared again later when I did the math and realized that tempo and that time come out to be 147 leg presses… (You won’t get the importance of that, but let’s just say it’s a Rhi thing you can ignore!) No, you can’t ignore it. I can’t, anyway. 47 & 147 are my favorite numbers. They show up in the weirdest places when I most need them. For some crazy reason, they give me hope that God is in control, that life isn’t random and empty, that I’m worth His attention to sprinkle little reminders throughout my life. You can call it a sign, you can call it synchronicity, I just call it hope. Today, hope is no longer a four letter word.

I talked with my best friend last night and we laughed about things that didn’t even start out being funny. It was so good to feel like life was going to be okay after it had felt so not okay! It was peaceful to feel like I was good enough and not alone. It was exciting to see potential in every moment. When I’m in a funk, I stop seeing those things. I know they are true but they don’t feel true.

A while back I coined a new term for being giddy about life and it’s potential while being very zen about knowing that whatever is meant to happen will happen. My best friend said she could dig it, and the word Zendiggity was born. That’s the mind-frame I most often reside in in life and that is where I am today. We all have bad days or even a bad few days, and we sometimes cry in our bowl of apples and/or consume a lot of doughnuts… but then it passes and we can breathe again and look at life more clearly and say, “I’m okay, I’m zendiggity.”