Tuesday, December 13, 2011

I'm sorry, what did you say your name was?

Know thyself.

Don't underestimate the power of this statement.

Ask yourself: How well do you know yourself, really? Much like you (probably) I would say most of the time, me, myself and I are a pretty tight knit group. I spend a lot of time with me. We're buds. We tell each other everything. I could rhyme off innumerable fun facts about me. I know what to buy me for Christmas.

But how do you know if you know yourself? It became clear to me today that the" knowing of thyself" is something of a moving target. I am a moving target.

Since coming home from my Worldwide Adventure, I have wrapped myself up in a beautiful delusion, a delusion where I think that I am somehow more "enlightened" and "self aware" now than I was before, because now I have traveled (oooohhh ahhh). No doubt, in many, many ways I am richer for the experiences I had and I wouldn't trade them for anything. But even though this past year really was about finding this "self knowledge", spending quality time with me, figuring out what makes me tick, learning to read my own emotions better, and to understand why I behave the way I do, it seems that I am no more "self aware" now than I was before I left. Dang...

Not to get all Oprah on you, but I do think that at least for a short while on the road, I attained a heightened sense of awareness about myself. When I had nothing else to worry about but my own happiness, I like to think I got me pretty down pat. It was a great time. But sadly, it turns out there was an expiry date on that state of self reflection. The "me" of only a few short months ago I knew so well....well, she isn't "me" anymore.

Allow me to put this philosophical rant in a little context. Today was an ordinary day. Sure, I'm having some stress about an upcoming exam, and I have a paper due that I am having serious mental block trying to write, but this amount of stress and demand is not anything that this kid hasn't handled before (and then some....no, and then lots). Actually, I would say today was less stressful than most days. I went to hot yoga in the morning, worked on my paper for the afternoon, and went to jiu jitsu at night. BJJ was even great. I had lots of energy and got in some good rolls. Then, on the walk home, I decided to call my parents just to say hi. My dad answered. I yelled at him, and then burst into tears.

......excuse me?

I've been trying to figure out why I've been a cranky pants for the past nearly-month. It's not just school. It can't be. This is the life I have chosen for a variety of very good reasons that I am pleased with myself for. School-related stress can't account for the venom I feel bubbling inside me every single day. It can't account for wanting to yell at old people for walking too slow, for the way I have been treating people around me who have done nothing wrong, or the elaborateness and specificity of escape plans I have been hatching in my head to run away again (only this time I would never come back). It can't account for me not wanting to celebrate my birthday at all this year (nor can being 'old' because I'm not old). For the past few weeks, I have chocked my rampant bitterness and terrible mood up to fluctuations in hormones (or rather, to put it delicately, "woman problems"), but I think that excuse has effectively expired now.

It's funny how the people close to you see right through your bullshit excuses and reasons you give yourself for acting a certain way. So, after my dad apologized for pissing me off (although remaining thoroughly baffled as to how he had managed to do that in less than a minute thirty) he mentioned ex-boyfriends name as a potential source of my horrific mood. BINGOOOOOOOOOOO. (sorry, no prize)

Bam. Crash. *Cue Niagara Falls*. Waterworks for hours.

I thought I'd been doing too well with this.

(Apologies now for breaking my promise that this blog would not be an outlet for spewing over the shrapnel of my failed relationship. I newly promise not to make this a regular thing, or to go on for too long about it.)

Yes, it hurts. Yes, I want to, in an alternating fashion, call him and tell him I think he's [insert explitive laced diatribe of your choice here] or call him and tell him it's okay I forgive him let's just forget this silly mess (but nonetheless still call him). Yes, I had already correctly identified that I am hurt and angry and sad about the situation. But apart from the initial aftershock, where have the tears been? Apart from the occasional revenge house-egging fantasy, how have I been able to function (relatively) normally? I've been trying to liken my reaction to this breakup to the downfall of my last major long-term relationship, the aftermath of which saw me morph into a bumbling self-destructive idiot with little appreciable self esteem, and not a detectable shred of dignity. I cried myself to sleep for months. And hey, isn't that what they do on TV, anyway? If it's on TV, it's normal! So why hasn't that happened this time?

I seem to have completely missed some obvious key elements. I missed the obvious that was so obvious to my dad. "Me" circa now is a WILDLY different creature than "me" circa that other relationship. This relationship was a world apart from the last. (also obvious - MY LIFE IS NOT TV). Why did I expect my reaction to stay the same when none of the variables are even remotely similar?

I am an excellent liar when it comes to lying to myself. I guess I don't tell me everything. How did I not connect the dots? My new health/eating awesomely/fitness/lets-get-the-body-I've-always-wanted regime? while not without its obvious merits and benefits (and I am enjoying the ride), it is a thinly veiled cover for me not dealing with my feelings about breaking up. It's a means to exert control over my situation because I had no control over my now defunct relationship. I lied to myself by thinking I could just carry on as if nothing was wrong. But I am clearly not carrying on as if nothing is wrong. I am wrong. I'm an angry, bitter, awful mess, and its not the fucking hormones (although they don't help) - it's him.

I'm surprised it took itself this long to manifest, but hey - now I know that I don't know where this is going. New me, new variables, different situation, I can't predict how I'm going to handle a break up this time around. It's uncharted territory, man. At least maybe now I can stop pretending I know what I'm doing?

Apparently, me calling my parents "just to say hi" is secret code (secret yes, even to me it seems) for I WANT TO EXPLODE AND I NEED TO CRY. Thinking back, I've done this before. Don't get me wrong, I love my parents and know full well that I lucked out in that lottery, but calling "just to say hi" is not something I do with them regularly, for whatever reason. Usually because my mom calls me at work a lot so I speak to her often. But the few times it has happened, it goes exactly like it went today. I call, nitpick about some innocent thing either one of them says, then burst into tears about something that has nothing to do with either of them. Who does that?

I guess I don't know this me as well as I thought I did. But now that I know enough to know I don't know, I'm looking forward to experiencing all the new shenanigans I get me into.

She's obviously not perfect, but she better be cool. I'm stuck with her (for now).


xox

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