My mind is a universe all its own. The rules are basically simple: everything changes. That simple rule, however often gets mistranslated into 'fear the coming change.'

Having anxiety is that fear of things to come, not knowing if they will be good for you, or bring about the total destruction of all things in a cosmic sense. (And no, that's not an over-exaggeration of the feeling. If anything it's over-simplified.)

When I have anxiety, it is impossible to describe; but I will try in case my story sounds something like yours.

It's too easy to fall into that trap of thinking no one understands, and that you're alone in your universe. But that's almost never the case. And even though the number of people who can identify exactly with you may be small, there is always a broad populous who can at least relate in a small way. So, for those of you who feel alone, as I do sometimes, tell your story. Even if you have to do it anonymously. You may not be alone after all.

My earliest memory: I was an infant, sitting in the seat of a shopping cart with my mother. I remember being aware of people 'watching' me, looking at "the baby" and doing and saying things that people do when they see a baby. It bothered me immensely. I remember thinking how I wish they would just leave me alone, and how I just wanted to leave. I also remember relying heavily, emotionally on the fact that my mother would keep me safe from them. A reliance that seemed faulty when two young (college age) girls approached her and asked to see "the baby." This was a terrifying proposition to me at the time, but I was unable to voice my objection to my mother. And of course, there wasn't anything cuter that I could've done at the time.

The girls started in with how cute I was not realizing that I was in fact terrified of this encounter. I began to cry. Embarrassed, my 'assailants' (as I viewed them) began to chuckle (which of course to me was a judgement and condemnation of my very soul.) My mother began to chuckle as well, which (and I cannot stress enough from my infantile perspective) absolutely broke my soul. I felt totally abandoned and alone.

The feelings of scrutiny and abandonment in that moment have reoccurred countless times since.

It's easy to take that first memory and experience as the source of my anxiety. However, that would probably be an over-simplification. Although I wouldn't argue the impact that first memory had in my childhood development as an emotional being, I think it would be a disservice to everyone with anxiety to effectively dismiss my life long struggle with anxiety as stemming from this one moment.

Life compounded with misunderstandings is often the external factors of anxiety. Most people can relate in some limited capacity to the fact that life can throw you a curve-ball you are not ready for, and cause you stress and "anxiety." (Those who have anxiety, will probably understand why that word is in quotations. But if you don't understand the reason, just trust the fact that while it is the same anxiety, it is not the same anxiety.)

Maybe a better way to think of the differences between what a "normal" person without anxiety feels when life throws them that curve-ball, and what that curve-ball does to a person with anxiety is to imagine anxiety as a professional studio mixer. (That's the thing with all the dials, faders, and lights, and things.)

Everybody's mixer will look a little different. Some levels will be set higher or lower, depending on your personality. Each channel on the mixer represents a different stress trigger (or anxiety.) There are thousands of channels on everybody's mixer, although most of them will be set to zero for most people. A non-anxious person will hear only one channel at a time through their day-to-day life. But when stressed, they may hear several i.e. kids crying, traffic, music too loud, whatever triggers stress in that individual. The same holds true for those with anxiety, with one variance; all the channels have some volume all the time. Even the ones that aren't stress triggers. (Remember there are thousands.)

Now imagine you're stressed, and you don't have anxiety. Your mixer simply raises the master volume. Your triggers all become louder according to their resting volume in relation to each other. (Not Fun)

When you have anxiety your master volume also raises, but so do all other channels independently of one another. Even the ones that have a resting volume near zero. Thousands of channels all increasing in volume until they are maxed out. If you can imagine that coming through your headset, your ears would be saturated by white noise. Everything becomes white noise. And we haven't even begun adding effects to any of the channels yet.

It's important to note this possibility when approaching some one with anxiety. Because it is very natural to ask, "what's the big deal? It's just. . . "

Well it isn't. And it is.

Yes it's just an interview. Everybody gets anxiety for an interview. But if you have an anxiety issue, it is never just an interview. It's never just making phone call, or filing a document, going to the bank or grocery store, or whatever. It's all of them. It's everything. It's the entire universe collapsing on one tiny emotional frame, that is a human spirit.

Growing up with anxiety is never easy, no matter who you are. But when you grow up having as limited social contact as I did, it becomes a different animal altogether.

We moved a lot growing up, so school was always a social challenge for me. I remember starting kindergarten near the end of the year and remaining in that school throughout 1^st grade. I had a group of friends, although I was very “shy,” and had very few issues with anxiety that I recall. The rest of my childhood education was not as easy.

From grades 2 to 4, I remember very little (most likely because we had moved several times, often to new states as well as schools.) In fact I can't say for sure if I even attended school during my 2 grade year.

I do remember one thing during those years in school: being afraid to raise my hand, or be called on.

I didn’t speak if I didn’t have to. And even then I limited myself mostly to saying I don’t know. (Even though I often knew the right answers.) Generally, I wasn’t called on much for that reason.

I didn’t raise my hand for anything. And there was nothing on earth that could make me. Not even the call of nature. But of course, you can’t hold it forever- as I found out time and time again.

I wet my pants more than a few times in grade school. The possibility of avoiding shame and embarrassment by staying in my seat until everyone had left the room, seemed more likely than the 100% certainty that would come if I raised my hand. Besides, I could hold it with general success. And I couldn’t raise my hand.

Fourth grade is the only year I remember having what I perceived was a normal kid’s school life. I had friends, a bully, tests and field trips, and very little anxiety. I raised my hand in class. Sometimes I only thought I knew the answer, but I wasn’t afraid. And even when I answered wrong, I still raised my hand the next time.

It was also the only year I began, and finished, in the same school as the previous year.

We moved the following winter. I began 5^th grade in a new school, in a new town, but would not finish out the year.

I never returned to school until I was 23. I passed the GED by the skin of my teeth and proceeded to fail college over the next several years.

It’s hard to guess what my academic life may have been like had my family not bounced around so much. But I’m fairly confident that, although my test scores may have remained similar, my social skills, and consequently my college efforts would have greatly benefited from a more stable upbringing. 

It would only later become evident, in my teenage years, how utterly unprepared I was to participate in the coming world. I came into adulthood with little to say, and even less knowledge on operating in a social world- and thus, had with little to do with it.

I believe it was Socrates who said, (paraphrasing) 'say nothing, do nothing, be nothing.' And I was nothing for a long time.

It took years to learn how to raise my hand again; and even longer still to raise it without fear.

surprise I'll reprisal.

Did you really think it was over? Me too. But as I sit in bed alone, away from the warmth of loving arms (and paws,) I ponder, I think, I dwell, and I remember. Remembering sucks. And what brought on this remembering, pondering, dwelling, thinking and sucking, was a late and sleepless night of sifting through pictures and delving back in time without the muted benefits of a prescription fed brain. But admit it; you've missed me. I know I have.

I feel like I've been living some one else's life for so many years. I'd forgotten what the drugs subdue. I'd forgotten about those pesky sads and feels. Yet somehow, by having myself drugged away for a time, I've found peace. Or so I thought. Well yes. The truth is that things have been going well for "me." Or the "me" that I've been playing at. But still. . . It seems tonight as though I have come back from hiatus and dawned that old skin; the one that never healed properly before, but just set aside to be mended later. Well it's later, and I'm still wounded.

Looking back I see then that I was eager for drugs. I was eager for anything that could numb me. My passion for life had been drowned in a series of misplaced trust and confidence. It's no wonder I wanted to kill myself at times. And it's no wonder too that when suicide proved useless, and things like trust and confidence became futile, there was little else to be done but to shed my self and allow whatever remained to be numbed by whatever kept the social wolves away.

I quit writing music. I didn't know how anyway. I couldn't feel it. Lyrics became forced and cliche. Music had no emotion anymore. It was just noise. Noise I didn't want to hear. Music rarely touched my mind.

I couldn't find the time or energy to go exploring, or hiking. My camera became yet another outdated dead piece of technology that sat in a drawer. It had taken all the pictures I cared to see or think about. In fact, I hardly looked at them anymore, as my computer fell into disrepair. I simply didn't care. Or maybe I didn't have the nerve to continue with them. It seemed as though the spirit of the things had died. And now they were near forgotten relics of some one's life I used to live.

I still wanted. I still had desire. I just couldn't define what I was in want of. I tended to my work, and the yard. I never concerned myself with things beyond those unless pressed. I left myself but one good friend and dared not allow any others. I retreated into my mind more than I had since I was a small child. The world beyond my bones did not concern me. Much of me was locked away. The rest was subdued. I have never been more depressed than the times I've been treated with drugs for depression.

But in all that dismal day-to-day, I found a value in staying busy that I had never seen before. I found stability in it. I've never felt stability before. It's different than feeling stable, or being stable. Feeling stability in one's self for the first time is subtle, and takes time to realize the feeling. For this reason it's unlikely that most people wouldn't recognize the feeling, having probably become accustomed to it at a much younger age than I. But when you're an adult experiencing stability of self for the first time, once you have recognized it enough to look back on it and see it, it is a profound emotion; an empowering emotion. Although it may take, yet again, a lengthy time to reveal, the tools you will have moving forward can change a person's life. Maybe yours.

So I've ditched the pills. They served their purpose in their time and now that time has ended. They taught my brain how to live knuckled down without needing to erupt. And that's a skill I don't plan to forget. But now it's time to un-inprison my wrongfully convicted brain and let it do what it always has, unimpeded and with new conviction. It will never find peace and happiness otherwise. Viva la brain! Viva, Love, Music!

Viva! Hillbilly Flyer

we come to an End.

if i'm being honest the time is well past this story's ending. i never seem to know how to exit. the friends i've made have mostly all gone now. i move in different circles than when i began, nearly seven years ago. to continue writing on this blog, the greatest years of my life, seems dishonest now, since my life is so radically changed.
have they been the greatest years? in some ways, yes. but in many, the answer is an unsurprising no.
i originally titled this blog as the worst year of my life, having began it nearly a year after the events in the first post. but when the mood of it all seemed to carry on into my daily life i continued writing, and eventually changed the title to the current The Greatest Years of My Life, a somewhat pessimistic and intentionally ironic theme under which i continued to pen.
although being intentionally ironic concerning the many woes of which i'd write, i was not at all ignorant to the fact that, though the times were tough, i was undoubtedly better off for enduring them, as my character was being unavoidably defined through these years. thus, the wisdom of the title has continued to inspire me to see beyond whatever my circumstances might have been as i have maintained this biographical irony; although, that fact is probably not well represented to the reader.
I do maintain that the years herein documented have produced some of my most critical moments in life, where the development of my character is concerned, as well as some of my most cherished. But as i stated above, there is such a distance between my life today and that of years past, that i feel it is best to end this chapter and begin another.
I cannot speak to the truth of this blog, only that it is true from my perspective. I wouldn't apologize for anything written here that hasn't already been addressed herein for the reason stated previously, that it is true to me, as well as being completely honest at the time it was written. Some may take issue with that, or other things left unresolved, that is their right, and i won't blame them. I too take issue with much of what I've written. I have never been one to accept what is left unresolved and move on from it unchanged. But as it seems to be an impossibility to close the book permanently on select events in one's life, i have little recourse but to move on from those things left unfinished and suffer them as dignified as i can, in relative silence.
I will never have accomplished the things i set out to do and didn't. Obviously there is nothing to be done for those things already done or not done. All i can do is look forward. And if the universe is kind enough to present to me a second chance at opportunities once passed, it will not be because of second chances at all; rather, the time for those things had, in reality never come at all, but will be presented then for the first time. Life is always ready on time. It's never late, or passed up. It never comes early for some more fortunate than ourselves. Things happen when they do. There is little use in energy spent assuming we are somehow not where we are meant to be. I am in life, at the point i am, not because i put myself here; but because it is my place in the cosmos, and no one else's.
It can be challenging to realize at times, but everything really is just as it's meant to be.
Of course I am human, and being so, i am not without regret. But those things are either plainly represented in this blog, or will continue to challenge me.
I will of course continue to write. I couldn't stop if i wanted to. However, it is time to acknowledge that the ironic "greatest years of my life" are indeed over, and perhaps have lapsed over into a not-so-ironic new chapter of life.
It would be too presumptuous to claim the coming years as anything greater than a new adventure and chapter of life. But i do look forward to what lies ahead with anticipation that mirrors those moments of peace that have been so rare before. I no longer fear what lies ahead because of what i leave behind. I fear what lies ahead because it is unknown to me. It is a strange and unfamiliar feeling to look forward in life rather than over my shoulder. My anxiety is no longer fueled by thoughts of what i might be leaving behind as i press forward, but instead i am anxious to shed my yesterdays and see tomorrow, although i feel wholly unprepared for its coming.
Thank you for reading, and for your comments. I hope you will follow me as i step forward in the journey of life and consciousness. I hope i will remain honest in my writing and continue to share with the world my one perspective out of the billions of others out there.
My new blog "An Overactive Universe" will begin soon. Until then, thanks for reading, and farewell.

Remember

How will i be remembered, and by who? I've been in love more times than i care to count. Which of them, i wonder, even think of me? I have a selective memory. But i don't get to choose the images. I'm still in love. I never knew there could be so many corridors in the heart to lose a part of myself in. If i could walk through them at a strolling pace, would those images i find there be true to reality now? I loved a girl once. But did i ever love her at all? Maybe i only loved a phase a girl was going through when i knew her. Maybe i never knew her. In which case, there is a long vacant corridor in my heart with an imaginary name etched above its entry. Maybe imaginary, but no less powerful. A name that refers to no one real has no less meaning than one's own name, provided the owner of the named is familiar with the address. Likewise, my imaginary love would mean no less to me had she never existed. For she may not have lived beyond the confines of my own mind and heart. Indeed, she may now and only, exist in that memory of my heart's imagination. If i am to be remembered at all, what might i be in the heart of another's imagination? The lost? The missed? The failed? I think i'd rather stay forgotten. I'd rather be forgotten alltogether, than be remembered wrong. I wish i could offer the same in turn. But i have a selective memory, of which i have no say in remembering.

What it is.

I can sit for hours just thinking about what to do next. But it's only when I finally decide to focus my scatter brain on something that the creaking above me begins, or the phone rings, or the terrorists to peace of mind begin to strike. It's not perspective. As Ashton would say, it's just "what it is." I get that now. All this time I had no idea the level of apathy he must have been wrestling with until recently. I wake up every day with that expression in one way or another. My particular brand is of the 'ugh' variety. How are you? Ugh. What's new? Ugh. What do you want? Ugh. I suppose if I wanted anything specifically the 'ugh.' might turn into an ugh! But probably not. I seem to have misused all my exclamations on the burned out expectations of yester-years. And though now when asked, I can only muster that three letter abortion of a thought expressed as ugh, there is still inside me a muted voice shouting so hard that my eyes would tear up if not for the dismissing philosophy of 'what it is.' If I had an answer to the question it has long been forgotten. Ugh doesn't require thinking about it. It really is about the most polite way of telling somebody to fuck off. How are you? Ugh. What's new? Ugh. What do you want? Fuck off! That's what i really want I suppose, for the rest of the world to just ugh! Sometimes I wish I could go back to being that guy who wore his heart on his sleeve and got used to it being mangled on a regular basis. At least then I could cry over something and know that I feel sadness. Now I just expect people to let me down and justify my lack of feeling sadness with ugh. What it is. I'm either on my way to being a very cold individual, or on my way to a total meltdown. I can't really tell at this point in time. What is can tell though, is every tear that has never fallen from my eyes, will eventually come pouring out. And there will be no amount of ugh that will dismiss it. We all crack eventually. What it is becomes 'what is it?' as we finally face the ugh life has handed us.

Heavy on my mind

I don't know what to write. I've thought for a long time that it was because I had run out of things to say, things that inspired me, or that I cared about. But that's not the case. The truth is that there is so much to say that I am buried beneath it all. I don't know where to begin. The thing that is on the forefront of my thoughts is beyond explanation. I don't know how to write it. I can't speak of it. I can hardly begin to touch the thought before I am overwhelmed, and then its gone, buried somewhere I've forgotten how to access. The sad thing about it all is that if I knew what do do about it, how to make it better, I'm not sure I would. The locked away thing has become a part of me. One so heavy I dare not try to cast it away, lest I leave myself more broken by the exertion of the act than I am by bearing it longer. Thus the dilemma. The longer I bear it, the more broken I shall be over time.