THE CACOPHONY IN MY HEAD

My mind is jumbled up; so jumbled it’s like a beehive of critical thinking, rational thoughts and daydreams- all at the same time. I am sad, but there’s even nothing I can pinpoint as the cause. I’m worried, but at the same time I didn’t even have anything to worry about until I started writing this. I realized that I had lots of worries pinching my mind. I have worries over myself; somewhere along the line in the past 3 years, I have lost a drive over my life- now it’s just like driving on an express highway; I know my destination; but how and when I’ll get there, I’ve lost the map.

I am left with probabilities and uncertainties and a lot of doubts. I am constantly reminded of how insane it is to live in the midst of no definitive rules or plans; I learnt three years ago that life can shit on your plans, the drag you to the gates of hell and back. Now, every morning, I wake up and realize again and again how difficult it is to live in the midst of chaos and randomness.

University days were bliss. Full of absolutes and certainties; the only uncertainty was results and even for that, there was an end plan that no matter what, one would graduate with a good grade.  I miss my childhood; the last time I had something close to complete happiness- now it’s all a mess and it’s slipping away. Like I don’t even have a grasp of things anymore.

However, in a way I love how things are right now; I would choose a million times not to see the world soundly; as a perfect entity, I would rather not trade in fairytales of how smoothly life would work out for some of us.  Yes, it’s a very lonely road right now. My friends are far ahead and it once in awhile makes me think about mess that is my life right now. Every day, the awareness that perhaps my best intentions for my own life is what is continuously making a mess of the whole thing threatens to sway me away- then leaves me looking longingly at other paths, or play with ideas in my head, imagine a great outcome, then when the realization of my previous disappointments comes on, I drop it all. I think I’m a mess.

I have always prided myself on my great memory. I remember situations, people, dates, events, meetings, chats, conversations. Recently, I worried that I might not be that girl with the great memory anymore; not I forget. Too much. I blamed it on the whirring thoughts; one thing not gaining enough ground before another threatens to come on- thereby displacing the previous yet-to-gain-a-ground one. I told my mother, she said I probably had too much on my mind; more things on my plate that I could handle. But I knew that wasn’t true. I haven’t had anything on my plate for a long time. I haven’t even been doing anything; I should remember but I stopped remembering, so I bought a jotter and started making notes.

My memory is how I define myself; it’s always been. It’s a recorder of where I’ve been, who I am, what I’ve been through; it’s a sum of my experiences, the things I want to keep in the long term. I think there’s a part of us that knows that memories fail us naturally, but it still doesn’t make it less disconcerting when we lose some. Maybe I’m overreacting- maybe it’s not even as bad as I’m thinking it is. Maybe I’m not even forgetting; I might be thinking of too many things at once.

           

I don’t want to say I’m overwhelmed but maybe that’s what I am. I am thinking of so many possibilities at once. So many questions, so many curiosities yet to be sated. How do I balance this and that? Where will this lead to? What am I doing? What’s the end game of this particular action? Love, parenting, family, job? How do people see me? Where do I need to develop myself? And these are the reasonable ones; the ones I can at least pin down. Most times, I’m just a jumbled mess of cacophonies: so many voices at once, so little stay, so little make meaning. Just a big box of daunting, worrying and pinching thoughts.

Last week, I went out; to the market to get some things I needed. It felt like a wave or rush, not sure which it was but it was like a million things hit my mind at once; all racing so fast that I couldn’t focus on one thing at a time, or do anything to stop it. I didn’t stop what I was doing as it was nothing physical but it didn’t change the feeling that my brain was charged with electricity and the moment I think of pinning one thought down, another replaces it.

So two days ago when I started writing this piece, my mind likened my mashed thoughts to an entangled rope/string. I imagined the barely staying pieces being the loose ends of the ropes; coming out in all direction and creating a confusion of where to start detangling from. I realized there were several choices I could make because sitting around and detangling the messes and jumbles would require so much time and energy. So the first solution would be to throw it all away. Shut down my mind; clamp down the thoughts and be selective on the things I allow myself to worry about. But of course I know this is close to being an impossibility.

Another option I have is to sit down, get comfortable with the mindset to straighten and separate each colourful, beautiful and maybe ugly strings; slowly, hour by hour, day by day, week by week till I have it all figured out. However, along with this option is the realization that I have a lot to do and time needs to be dedicated into doing it- for the greater good. Of course some of my strings and jumbles need to be cut off; completely terminated but when I eventually get finished, I would have a beautiful life/ ropes in this case- with the full will to forge ahead into a great future.

What I was able to come up with yesterday is that for awhile, I have been stressing my mind on could-have-beens and would-have-beens. Therefore, my mind has in turn been coming up with stress response changes. Now, the immediate solution is just to calm myself and wait to bring an end to the stress response changes, reduce the rate at which I think about unfavourable things as that’s the fastest way to sicken my mind. I practiced it between yesterday evening and this morning and I can say with all confidence that my racing thoughts and jumbled messes are dwindling gradually- at least for today.

Shoving it all back and surrendering to my inability to unravel the fast paced thoughts; only to bring it up when I have to make a decision is no longer an option. If I keep doing that, one of these days, I might just lose my mind. So I am currently stuck staring into the turmoil, gathering the energy to go on with positivity.