Passed

I can't shake the feeling I'm getting passed by.

I went for a 12-mile run over the weekend, in preparation for a half marathon my friend convinced me to sign up for, even after I committed to stop racing after the mildly traumatic experience of my last half marathon. Honoring my commitments to myself is something I need to work on. It is one of many things I need to work on. Like focus.

So during my run, a number of people passed me. This isn't unusual. Chicago isn't the healthiest city, but we do have a considerable number of runners. So whether I'm running on the North Channel Trail, the Lakefront Trail, or even through the neighborhoods, I'm liable to meet some other runners along the way. Usually, there is a combination of slower and faster runners, but on this particular morning, it seemed like the latter far outnumbered the former. I passed one runner. At least 5 passed me, including a woman who somehow passed me twice, even though we were not running a loop. I suspect she was the universe's evil pawn, sent just to fuck with my confidence.

It shouldn't have mattered who or how many passed me. It wasn't a race. But the fact that I noticed this and was bothered by it tells me a lot about the mental space I'm occupying. It tells me that I'm feeling inferior. And I do. I feel painfully aware of my shortcomings in all areas of life.

I log onto social media and see friends and colleagues getting engaged, getting married, having kids, getting promotions, getting published, making art, taking fancy vacations and socializing prolifically. I see smiles and friends and confidence and pets that are way more famous than mine. I see success, and I know I'm not seeing the whole picture, but I feel more acutely than ever my own failures.

I'm doing okay, but I'm not excelling. I'm certainly not thriving. I'm stuck in a career that is a decent career and pays the bills (and more), but makes me feel like I'm suffocating. Quite literally sometimes. I'm not getting married anytime soon, because my boyfriend thinks planning a wedding would be too much stress for me. Meaning he knows I'm not in a good mental health place and fears I'd collapse under the absurd kinds of pressure and stress a wedding places on people these days. I'm not at all into having kids, mostly because I don't want to pass down the crazy genes I inherited in spades, and also because I'm not particularly well right now. I'm struggling to just be a functioning member of society. I'm an unwilling member, at the very least. Instead of celebrating milestones, I'm going through the motions, and it's all because of fear.

A volcano of fear, which I bury by performing manic rituals of consumption: Buzzfeed articles, sugary carbs, television and a steady diet of material consumerism. These are the things that keep me sane. And by sane, I mean in denial. Or at least in avoidance. I am avoiding the volcano, and the more stuff I pile on top of it, the longer I pretend it's not really there, the more dangerous it becomes. The more inscrutable it becomes.

At this point, it no longer feels like something I can chip away at. It feels like something that needs to explode, obliterating everything in its path. And as exciting and dramatic (read: appealing) as that sounds to me, I know it's not the responsible thing to do. The responsible thing to do is to keep going to work, keep meditating, exercising and eating (mostly) well, maintaining solid connections with my friends and family, and using my free time to do the homework my career counselor assigns to me. It sounds so straightforward. It sounds like a good plan. If you're a healthy, functioning human being. If, on the other hand, you're depressed and anxious, it sounds insurmountable. It sounds exhausting, and it feels like failure.

There are too many thoughts in my head to explain how and why I find it all so daunting. But when I'm not avoiding my feelings with the aforementioned rituals of consumption - or simply the demands of each day - I feel paralyzed. I watch the world passing by, and I despair of ever getting out from under this weight that has me pinned to the ground.

But I read books. A lot of books, especially the ones written by females who write, women who do comedy or make art and who also have struggled with crises of confidence and setbacks in their careers, if not full-blown mental illness. I feel less alone, and not entirely without hope. I feel a little courage, enough to write something down instead of burying it. So maybe the volcano won't have to explode. Or maybe it will, but if it does, it won't destroy me.