It’s at the calmest of days when it haunts you. Teases you. Lingers within you.
It starts very small, usually you barely even sense that it’s there.
But when it stays for too long, the weight becomes too heavy. Suddenly, you’re asking yourself why do you feel so tired when you know you shouldn’t be? Especially at the most chill days, why then?
Apparently, that’s its cue.
Living with anxiety has been a part of my lifestyle ever since. I’d like to think I was trained in a high-pressure environment that expanded my capability to endure tough love.
Yeah, that’s the only good side to it.
Unfortunately, its repercussions weigh so much more. The bad side consumes you. Devours you.
You will think about that every minute of every day; on the tiniest things, on the most minor events, or even on the smallest details.
You find yourself constantly gasping for air, looking for a way out, an escape room, a broken window, anything. Anything that could help you catch your breath.
There is a feeling that you always have to move. Constantly move.
It’s like for every second that passes that I am not doing anything, I am going to regret it. A product of capitalism, one must say.
While I am not entirely certain about what exactly causes it, I know fully well what it does to you.
It torments you. This never-ending crippling anxiety.
Some days you expect it, most days you don’t.
Some days the feeling just becomes part of your system, most days you feel like hell. Like there is something other than you that is in control.
You fight with the universe to have a grasp of the situation, until you realize you can’t. Instead, you wait for it to pass because that’s really all you can do: Go through the storm.
When it’s finally over, you find yourself in a place with a (false) sense of hope that you are better. That you won’t get to experience it again… until you do. Sooner than you think.
The great circle of life.
Don’t get me wrong. I love my life. I love living. I love expressing myself. I love getting creative.
But my anxiety is getting on my way. It is my greatest enemy in life.
I did not choose it. No one wants to choose it. It’s just it. Right there. Stuck with you.
Now the challenge is, what would you do with it?
Sulk, and forever be a slave to your own mind? Or suck it up, brave through the storm, and be your own damn hero. A hero of you from you.
To anyone who has been struggling with anxiety, I hear you. I feel you. I understand you.
This is a reminder that you are not alone in fighting this battle. Hand in hand we stand, together we are strong. Together, we are undefeatable.
