Sebastian and I

In my first completed novel Elemental. The main character is Sebastian, a fourteen year old boy. Black hair and blue eyes and a permanent scowl are his most distinguishing feature.

He pushes people away and prefers to keep to himself. For their safety, is the excuse.

He has powers that can make him dangerous. So isolates himself so he doesn't have to feel the pain of hurting someone he actually cares about.

He is standoffish' short tempered, and hard to talk to at the best of times. Truly he's just lost. But almost no one can see it.

I imagine that he and I have been in exactly the same situation.

Sitting in a chair, in the sun but not really feeling the warm rays. Head in hands. Wondering what we're doing with our lives.

I know how Sebastian will find his way to happiness. I don't know how i will. Whoever is holding the pen to my story. I hope they aren't the kind who likes to torture their protagonist.

I don't want to think

I don't want to think or create anything. Yesterday i was so pumped about the chaper i wrote. Today i don't even want to look at it.

I just want to bury my head under my pillow and stay like that for a long time. I don't understand.

This can't be what everyone feels like or no one would leave the house. Why is this a thing? I don't like it.

I wish i had something uplifting and motivating to tell you guys but today i just don't.

There just doesn't seem to be a point to anything. No one cares about who i am anyway. Everyone just reads one article on Aspergers and thinks they have me all figured out.

I'm more than that, or i'd like to say i am. But i'm not. I'm really not.

I don't know anymore

I used to think i could tell when things were starting to slide again. But i didn't see this low coming. It just slapped me in the face with all of my self doubts.

I suppose it is a part of depression, that it just comes when it wants to and you don't even have to be doing anything.

I can't even look at my writing, because i just hate every sentence if i do. All the work that went into those stories feels like a waste of time.

I've been blasting songs that have gotten me through hard times before. Going on walks until my legs ache. Trying everything to keep it away.

I've had so many oppurtunities where i could have said that i needed help. Or that i wasn't doing so well. I could reach out but i...

I feel like people either would think i'm just complaining or not care at all.

Where are my friends during all this you may ask? The answer is Working. Busy. Studying. Whatever.

I'm sure they wouldn't enjoy hanging out with me anyway. They all know, the few real friends i do have that things have been hard lately for me.

Its not their fault, they have lives to live and just don't have time for me.

I'll just drag myself through as much routine as i can. Try and make life easier for everyone else. I don't want to think so i'll just do chores so that i can't.

No more of 'I wonder if this is as good as theirs'

I go back and forth alot, in what i think about my work and what i think about myself.

You know, i compare myself to other writers and i sit and i think "i have to be as good as them. I have to be better than them" until today.

Today i was reminded, and i'm sure i will need reminding many times in the future. That No. I do not have to be better than anyone. I don't have to hold myself to their standards.

I only have to be as good as i can be. And that is something that i have struggled with, because i've always been trying to fit in.

Its a part of having difficulties at school, you know i just wanted to be the same as everyone else. I just wanted to be able to kick a ball like they could. In the exact same way as them.

So i held myself to their standards and i was only happy if i had the approval of my peers. And i ran myself into the ground trying to reach their level. Trying to win their approval.

I couldn't, and i never did. Because even if i was doing my best i always felt like it wasn't good enough. I'd put 110% into acting which is something that i love, and i still got a D.

So then i didn't know what to do anymore, because putting everything into what i wanted had worked in the past and now it wasn't good enough.

Then I did volunteer work and putting everything into that didn't put me at everyone elses level either. In fact, i felt incredibly inadequate compared to the other workers.

So, i quit everything. I let myself fall into a deep hole. There may have been other factors. You know my cat passed away quite suddenly and it was a difficult time.

But really, every time i've fallen down. Its because i have tried so hard to meet others standards that i have burned out.

This has only happened because i worry too much about what they think. Because i hate feeling inadequate or like i can't do something.

So i know, that only holding myself to my own standards and not worrying about other people or comparing myself might be hard. Especially as a writer. I might not always get it right.

But it will take so much burden off of me, and i won't be as inclined to fall and not get up again. You know resilence only gets you so far.

Wanting to prove yourself to the people who doubt you. 'Fuck you' energy, that only goes so far. It won't push you as far as you want to go.

You can get there. Only if you get yourself there. Because you believed in yourself and you didn't hold yourself down.

Anxiety and Comparisions

Sitting outside in the sun, the anxieties of last night seem really far away. Even though it would take very little to bring them straight back.

One rule of writing is never compare yourself to other writers, especially if they are published and you are not. Because they have an entire team helping them make this novel, and you only have you.

If you want to salvage any of your self esteem. Don't compare. Not that its easy to avoid. We all compare ourselves to others constantly. Seeing how we measure up compared to them.

Having anxiety doesn't make my writing better, even though there's alot of talk about how being mentally ill and creative are linked.

It doesn't make your work of better quality and it certainly doesn't give you an edge over other creative people.

It just isn't true.

I am Depression

I am Depression
I'm like a lion in the long grass
You can't see me,
And i sneak up on you so quietly
You'll never know i'm coming.

I am Depression
I am a poison
I seep into your blood
Into your breath
Until i am you. All of you.

I am Depression
I steal all the colour from the world
I make you so tired…
I take and take and take
I take everything.

I am Depression
I can be fatal
Because I am patient
As long as your heart beats
I'm still there.

I am Depression
I don't need to be here
I only weigh you down
I can be so heavy if you carry me
Alone.

I am Depression
One day i will be banished
And the colour will slowly return for us
But until then you just have to remember
I can't hold you forever.

'Don't worry'

People tell me that I shouldn't worry, bu the only time I can't is when I've had alcohol so really it seems pointless.

Usually its said an exasperated way, as if they are so sick of having to reassure the anxious person. As if somehow its my fault. Actually that's usually why i stop expressing my worry, because it feels like somehow its my fault and I'd rather just shut up.

It doesn't seem to occur to them that if they took it seriously and stopped making a joke out of it, i might believe them when they said 'Don't worry, it's fine'.

I might be being unfair because its not their fault they don't know about the Meditation i have to do every night to keep as much of a hold on my anxiety as i can. Or the fact that sometimes it's so bad that I will gag simply as a nervous response when I'm doing something that makes me anxious. or the six months of therapy I had just to combat that particular symptom.

They just see the things I'm afraid of, storms, crowds, making phone calls. Leaving the dog and the cat to fend for themselves for any length of time. They make fun of it, or tell me to relax as if that's somehow an option.

Obviously they don't know anything about Anxiety or the things that make it worse. See, this is what ignorance does. This is why educating people is important, so they know what to say and what they shouldn't say.