Shelby often starts yoga class asking us to name one thing we’re grateful for and then how we want to feel. A couple weeks ago, tears sprang to my eyes as my soul answered the latter with “not like me”.
I don’t want to feel like me.
Taken aback but unsurprised—I had walked in salty, told her I needed an attitude adjustment, had been fighting with everyone personally and professionally—I told myself to sit with it, not overanalyze it, and just go into the yoga.
But since, I’ve continued to grapple with it: I don’t want to be like me. I don’t want to be who I’ve made myself up to be. I don’t want to be THIS.
But then … if I’m not the me I created, who am I?
There are a few pop culture references that mirror this experience: “How am I not myself?” from I Heart Huckabees (a movie I hated by the by); or the direct contrast of Gavin DeGraw’s ‘I Don’t Wanna Be’ … anything other than me … when I want to be anything other than me.
And yet this isn’t an existential crisis in the ways I’ve experieneced them before – restless, yearning – but more like striving, achieving – and then not wanting that which I thought would bring happiness.
But the truth is that I do the living in the moment and loving what you have and all those things. I am happy day to day. I am happy with who I am when I ask myself or think about it.
BUT THEN YOGA SPRINGS UP AND REVEALS WHAT YOU DIDN’T WANT TO ADDRESS.
So what am I not happy about?
Or who am I not happy about being?
I am not happy about yelling while fighting with Brian. Yelling at all. I am not happy with drinking to numb what being me feels like. I am not happy with how much time I spend working or thinking about work, and the things that have fallen by the wayside because of the amount of time I spend doing that: painting, travel without working, reading, lazy days, my yard. I am not happy about not wanting to cook, or try new recipes. I am not happy about how much money I’m spending and I am not happy about living in Austin and I am not happy with the clutter in my home.
And most of those things are because I wanted to be an executive, because I want so badly to make a difference in people’s lives in my team’s life and to do what I view as right that I might have pushed too hard. and it’s easy to see when my boss is doing it. less easy to see when I am.
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I wrote this a few weeks ago, and since have tried to be really, really conscientious about my working hours, my attention, and my focus. I’ve hosted friends for dinner twice, even trying a new recipe one of those times! I signed up for a volleyball league, and am doing more yoga. I am getting back to wanting to be me. 🙂