The Little Prince and the Fox

Today I’m feeling tired and hopeless. 

The only thing I’d like to do now is be out in the mountains on a nice long hike or trail run. But I cannot do it, nothing even close to it, because I have so much prep work for my classes tomorrow. 

Hopefully a “to-do” list will get me through this day. 

And hopefully some sunshine will peek through these rain clouds… 

You know those moment when the Universe seems to be pointing clearly in one direction for you? 

Well, I feel like that might be happening to me now. 

I’m an atheist, or maybe a “spiritual or naturalistic or universal atheist”. Anyway, I certainly don’t believe in any God or destiny. But sometimes it feels like all events around us seem to point or lead in some direction, maybe toward something that we’ve been pondering for a while and all of a sudden that “something” could become real, more than a dream or fantasy, and we’re faced with the real decision of “do we go for it or not?”. 

And now I could have the chance to go and stay in Colorado, with my friends/host family where I stayed and had such a wonderful, healing time this past summer: I could go stay there anytime as early as this December through all of next summer… 

The thought of asking them for hospitality for a few months had already been playing through my head for a while now, maybe even months, but I was envisioning it happening after next summer, as of autumn 2022, after wrapping up the academic year and a few other practical things here. However, they actually invited me to stay at their place now. 

It all happened this week. First, at the beginning of the week, I got an email from my supervisor for next Spring 2022 semester which entails a worsening of my work conditions to the limit of making them unsustainable for me. This of course caused anger, frustration, disappointment and even concern; but from the practical viewpoint it only confirmed or anticipated frustrations and concerns I already had about my current professional position lacking growth opportunities and being unsustainable for me for much longer: it basically transformed this “much longer” into “next spring”. Then, on Wednesday, in one of my rare phone conversations with my parents, my father spontaneously, out of the blue, reminded me of some financial funds available to me that he could send me anytime, if I needed extra money (I hadn’t mentioned anything, I swear!). Then yesterday, I talked to my PhD advisor (who has known me and been one of my most important mentors for over a decade) and was telling him about my professional frustrations and concerns, including the fact that I’m overworked and stifled so I cannot pursue a professional project which really interests me (and for which I have signed an agreement outside of school); and he said to me, “Can’t you go stay with someone — family, friends — for a few months, so you don’t have to worry about rent, take time off from work this spring and summer, and just focus on that other project of yours and get your textbook published, which will provide you with the satisfaction and professional growth that you need?”. And finally, yesterday afternoon, my friend/host in Colorado called me to tell me they will be traveling back and forth between Colorado and Europe for the next six months and asked me if by chance I’d like to stay at their place to house-sit while they’re away, working from there, and just being all of us together when they’re here in the U.S.?

All of this after months of troubles and concerns with my current living situation, that is unsustainable in the long run and will have to change for sure by next summer at the latest (I have to move out by then). 

Doesn’t this all look like the arrow is pointing me to Colorado for the next months? 

It feels like things are opening up for me there, even if only temporarily, while getting harsher for me here… 

As a real adventurer, I am ready to pack my bags and go in January. 

However, I have three concerns. 

Firstly, my friends here. I have a couple of lovely old friends here as well as some wonderful new friendships I’ve been building over the past few months and which all mean so much to me… I’d really miss them. 

Then, there are two practical aspects. On one hand, quitting my current teaching job between semesters isn’t ideal: no matter how soon and diplomatically and professionally I do it, it would probably entail never returning to teach at this particular school, or at least not teaching some of the fun, interesting courses I have built up to in these past four years. And I would have no idea of where I would be working as of next fall, no idea of where I’d be living even. So if I take this step now, I need to accept the idea that I’m leaving a lot of certainties behind (no matter how frustrating or stifling or unsustainable they might be) and heading into BIG uncertainty. On the other hand — last but not least! —, there’s the practical aspect of benefits, especially my health insurance: although my current job pays an unsustainably wage, it does offer me good benefits, including a good health insurance. If I quit my job, or am unemployed as of January, what happens to my health insurance? Would I have to pay a health insurance all out of pocket, while not earning any money, for at least six months, maybe more — and without a new job lined up anywhere in the near future? Is that sustainable, or even reasonable, for me to do???

So am I pondering a leap of faith, here, or a crazy jump off a cliff???

https://www.npr.org/2021/10/23/1048723012/life-kit-how-to-better-manage-your-time

In this report on NPR about “time management”, it was also being suggested that when making our decisions on what to “fail at”, it would be better to not always or necessarily choose to do what makes us happy in the present moment but rather what allows us to grow. 

I think this could be a helpful way for me to look at my own nagging question about what ball should I, or can I, drop now? What can I put on the shelf now, at least temporarily? Or vice versa, what do I choose to pursue now? 

It would be really good for me to choose the things that make/help me grow: if any of the things that I’m already doing provide this growth, great, pursue them! If not, go for something else! 

Sure, the question still remains of what is it exactly that helps me grow? — really not an easy question. But at least this viewpoint gives me a healthy perspective and a direction in which to move — and one that resonates with me since I’ve been feeling stifled, as in “lacking growth opportunities”, for a while now (at least professionally)… 

My 5-mile run yesterday evening was a struggle: I felt exhausted, physically tired, with low energy and short/shallow breathing, and mentally fatigued. I was really frustrated by the shortness of my breath — which is still unclear whether it’s an effect of my having been sick with COVID in March 2020 and/or due to anxiety or stress/exercise-induced asthma with some other cause. On top of that, I was also struggling to get out of my head, as all the small aches and pains, some old some new, made themselves noticed and I started wondering whether some of them might be due to the antidepressant I started taking ten days ago. If so, they might be dangerous, so I might have to stop the antidepressant but then, I thought, that’s not something I can do all of a sudden — and what about curing my depression in the first place? Then I started thinking of next semester, of the even heavier workload I’ll have then, how will I manage it? But could I financially or even legally afford taking time off? Etc. etc. etc.

I got into this loop of negative thoughts where everything seemed like an unsolvable problem, and then I heard it. That thought forming in my mind: “I just want to —“. But I stopped before completing it. And then I said to myself (all this dialogue is going on inside my head while I’m running!): “You were going to say ‘die’, right?” —  “Yep” — “Okay but now you’ve got this 5-mile run to finish”. And I stopped ruminating. I just finished my 5-mile run. And then hung out a little longer at the beach to enjoy a beautiful, beautiful sunset and take pictures of it. 

At that point I felt a quiet, grounded happiness mixed with a touch of melancholy. 

When I got home, the melancholy got stronger, but instead of fighting it or ignoring it or trying to escape it, I embraced it, I let myself feel it and understand where it was coming from. And indeed, I understood its causes and named them out loud, speaking them out loud to myself as well as telling a close friend about them in a voicemail. 

And then I took good care of myself: I skipped a meeting that would have stressed me (is this one of the balls I can drop?!?); I made myself a hearty dinner and enjoyed it; I relaxed with a movie. 

By the time I got to bed last night, my melancholy had abated: it was still there but having acknowledged it and knowing its cause exactly (and possibly a solution for it) made me feel tranquil and grounded both about that specific emotion and about myself in that moment, in that specific “here & now”. And for the first time in weeks, I went to bed feeling that I wanted to be with myself; that instead of drowning or quieting my emotions with a guided meditation from the Calm app, helped by an external voice, I wanted to actually be with myself and my own feelings, let myself be and enjoy being myself even if I wasn’t as happy as I would ideally be: I still felt grounded and somehow serene. But most of all, I felt I was in the moment. And that that moment, just like those last couple miles of my run when I finally stopped ruminating, was the only thing that counted then. Like each little step on my run, each little step that I struggled and dragged myself through yesterday evening. Each little step counts and that’s the only thing that really counts in each given moment. Here & now. 

Not quite a full bounce back from depression, yet, but maybe a nice little hop back nevertheless!

Last night I happened to listen to this report on NPR about “time management” with tips that are quite different from the usual ones of “task optimization”: 

https://www.npr.org/2021/10/23/1048723012/life-kit-how-to-better-manage-your-time

It’s basically suggesting we admit our human limits, our mortality, the fact that time isn’t infinite and that we cannot do everything, so they suggest choosing what we want to “fail at”, i.e. what we can or must give up, even if just temporarily, for a while, and make peace with that.

For me this was quite a serendipitous piece to listen to, because one of the major causes of my anxiety and stress lately is wanting to do too much, and do to it all perfectly well.

I just cannot. 

So now the question remains for me: what ball do I want to drop for the time being? What am I willing to put on the shelf, or to “fail at”, at least momentarily?

In the past months, since this spring, a sentence that has often rung in my ears or run through my head, and that I’ve felt very deeply, has been “This boy in me”. 

Lately, this has become, “This boy that is me”, as in “This boy that I am”. 

This boy that has waited years, almost my entire life, to come out, to be seen, acknowledged, understood… even by my own self. 

This is my priority now: letting this boy that is me be. Letting him come out and express himself entirely and just enjoy being himself. 

I keep getting caught up in thoughts and concerns about my next professional step, my career, my goals… But this is my true goal now. This is why no matter how much I try and force myself to focus on work and career, the main thing I really want to do (and end up dedicating lots of time to) is intense exercise: to get into my body, to connect with the boy in me, to let my physical strength come out and show itself, visibly, even to me. To look at myself in the mirror and see the boy I am. 

There are aspects of wonderful self-discovery and empowerment in all this but also a huge amount of loss: all those years that boy was not allowed to be. 

And now that I am feeling this loss together with the desire to shout out loud, “See this boy!!!”, now that I am experiencing symptoms of depression from all the loss but also deeper feelings of self-awareness and grounded happiness — now I think I’m getting really close to understanding the depression and body-image issues that non-binary/trans persons often experience … now I think I’m feeling it on, or under, my own skin… 

I tend to rush. And even now I wish I could fix this already and move on with the practical things in my life. But I cannot rush it — as my counselor wisely reminded me this morning. I need to give myself, this boy, as much time as I — and he — need(s). 

Slow down and just be.

Yesterday I had a meltdown. It came at the end of three sleepless nights, at the end of my workweek with all its accumulated stress (mostly emotional), after three particularly tough weeks. 

The specific trigger (but not the real cause) of yesterday’s meltdown was the fact that my friend where I was supposed to stay for a few hours while my place was being disinfested from rodents had a serious problem of her own and last minute was unable to offer me the shelter I was counting on. I wasn’t upset at her, of course — she’s one of the most nurturing and reliable persons I know, and indeed she talked to me on the phone for almost an hour during my meltdown, first trying to help me find alternative solutions to my practical problem of where to hang out for a few hours, then showing empathy and validation for my emotional state, and finally offering support to find reasonable and effective solutions to my current state.

I’m feeling better today, and that’s why I can write about it. But it’s a transient, or shaky, “better” — I know that. For a while now, I’ve been feeling like I’m on a ledge, on the edge of an emotional/mental abyss. The highs are wonderfully high and definitely coming from amazing growth and improved awareness and lessons learned. But the lows are terrifying in how dark they can get, in ways that are totally unrecognizable to me as “myself” but clearly recognizable as symptoms of trauma-induced depression.

I know that’s what it is. There have been several events in the past two and a half years of my life that have built up to this current emotional state where old trauma from my childhood and teenage years is resurfacing so intensely, even so violently, that at times I can hardly keep myself together. 

And unfortunately my current job, which I used to love so dearly, is another trigger for that trauma: so for the past month and a half my trauma has basically been getting triggered regularly two or three times a week and my body (including my brain as an organ and thus part of my physical body) just cannot take it anymore. 

I am working on practical solutions, including starting to work with a psychotherapist, reaching out to my doctor to get me on antidepressants, and looking around for alternative jobs. But none of these solutions solve the problem in the moment, when a meltdown actually happens. When the meltdown hits, like yesterday, and all I want to do is sit and cry, and all my head can think is “I want to die” or “I don’t want to be alone anymore” or “I cannot do this by myself”, in those moments I need something that will rescue me on the spot. Fortunately those moments are still unfrequent enough to allow me to function in my daily life; and fortunately, although intense, these moments can still be turned around by a phone call or visit with a good friend (or sometimes even a good run in the sunshine or immersing myself in some fulfilling work). But what if I get to the point where all these tools and helping hands aren’t enough anymore? 

For now, I’m still well enough that I can get up after a good night’s rest (which I thankfully got last night), see the sunshine outside my window (which is shining this morning, thank goodness!), and actually feel thankful for what happened yesterday. Because the meltdown that my friend so inadvertently triggered but then so willingly helped heal yesterday, that meltdown reignited in me the willingness and capacity to rescue myself, to take care of myself, to effectively love myself. I went and got myself a yummy lunch in one of my favorite outdoor places, eating in the sunshine; then did some grocery shopping that I really needed before coming home and actively fixing up my place after the rat-disinfestation; and finally made myself a delicious dinner before getting myself to bed nice and early to recuperate some sleep. I did for myself what the child in me would need a parent to do for them. So I’m immensely thankful to my friend for yesterday, as well as several other good friends who understand and are supporting me through this rough patch. 

But what if I get to the point where I cannot rescue myself, or be rescued, anymore? What happens then?  

Was is it that always makes me feel so giddy after going out with this non-binary climber that I like? Is it just that I like them so much? And/or that they’re the first non-binary person that I’ve ever liked so much? 

Or is it that in some ways they — and the interactions with them — remind me so much of the “boulderer” & the times I went out with him?  

They are completely different persons — yet, in some ways they’re similar — for instance, they’re both very good boulderers (climbers who prefer and are better at bouldering that rope-climbing, while I’m much more confident on rope)… And they both seek me out, keep up the connection with me in a way that is friendly and pleasant and showing interest but also unclear — it could be interest as “just friends” or “something more” (expressions I very much dislike but that are “standard” and hard to “translate”). I don’t know in what way, for what reason exactly they enjoy hanging out with me — as I didn’t with the boulderer. And in both cases, I feel some deeper interest and attraction to them — an emotion that makes me feel vulnerable.

And after the misunderstandings or confusion or “mixed levels of relationships” with the boulderer, I now feel much less confident with this other person I like because I’m double-guessing myself: what if I’m getting carried away just as I did before and I get burned again? What if I ruin the relationship? What if I make a mistake, again?

Yesterday evening, this special climbing friend (this “new boulderer”)&I went climbing together and then out for dinner — and it was such a lovely Friday night! One of my best Friday nights in a long time. But what if it wasn’t so special for them? What if it means so much more to me than to them? I don’t want to get hurt again…

I’m really upset (and have been for a while now). 

I’m angry. And sad. And also feeling lost. 

My job doesn’t pay the bills. Nothing much new about this, I guess — unfortunately, there’s plenty of people in the world who would say the same (and many more who are in truly dire conditions). 

But I am going to indulge myself and write about my personal anger and sadness here. 

I am angry and sad that my job — a job that is super important to society (teaching), that I love, that I put my heart & soul into, and that according to everyone I’m very good at — doesn’t pay my bills. 

I have a PhD in the subject I teach (Physics); I’m fluent in five languages; I have international experience working in the industry as well as academia, including doing research on top of teaching — and I can’t pay my bills. 

Why can’t I pay my bills? 

Because I haven’t followed the “standard, beaten path” — for anything. I didn’t go for tenure-track positions. I didn’t stay in jobs paying the big bucks in the industry. I refuse to work 80-hour weeks. So I can’t pay the bills. Because I live in a place where overwork is one of the highest values and marks of “success” (however ‘success’ may be defined). Because I live in a place where education isn’t valued — on the contrary, it’s probably feared because it would free people’s minds and subvert the status quo. 

I know there are places where my situation would be even worse, where education is valued even less —  as there are places where my job would be valued and paid very highly. 

But I wanted to live here. I loved it here. I thought I had found home here, at last. But now I don’t know anymore. I’m at a loss. I don’t know what to do. 

All I know is that my situation isn’t sustainable anymore. That at the end of this school-year, come next summer, something substantial needs to have changed, or to be underway, for me. But I don’t know in what way. 

I’m at a loss — angry and sad and feeling lost.  

“… 

I walk with angels that have no place 

… 

I walk 

Streets of fire 

Streets of fire 

Streets of fire 

Streets of fire” 

[Bruce Springsteen, “Streets of fire” (a little edited)]

“… 

Baby if you want to be wild 

You’ve got a lot to learn 

… 

” 

[Bruce Springsteen, “Candy’s room”]

I feel that the trail race last Saturday flipped a switch in me again, bringing back to my own self, or to my own awareness, a healthy part of me that I had forgotten or thought that I had lost. But I also keep feeling new, renewed, like I’m on the threshold of a whole new phase for myself, or already walking through the fields of a new continent. Somehow the timing of that race was perfect, with the last summer weekend turning into this first week of autumn and jumping over the hump of that “special date” on Monday that marked the very end of something that needed leaving behind for good. 

I don’t know exactly what’s going on inside of me in this moment but I have a feeling that if I navigate it well, this new season could bring a lot, especially to this boy in me.