Do you ever feel like you or life is in slow motion and you want to scream? It's hard to explain, but something like the feeling of standing on railroad tracks, watching the oncoming train, and feeling paralized. It's been a long time, but I started to feel like that lately a couple days. It usually happens when my head is trying overwhelm me by throwing up multiple task lists and some judgmental stuff like "you're not getting enough done...". It's an exercise in expectations of self gone awry, coupled with some numbness and impending doom.
Yeah...and this is not an old feeling for me, but a rather constant one. I have lived in chaos and making mountains out of molehills for so long. I have been living one day at a time, but in the back of my head I expect some thing to go horribly wrong and that I am going to fuck up everything. I guess for you this is something that happens less often now that you have time. For me, it's something I am still really struggling with. I feel like I have one of those jobs like working at a post office. I work and work and nothing ever gets finished and it is the same crap again the next week. Plus the work environment is punitive and unfriendly so I feel like if I forget something I will get punished. It's whack.
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Keep coming back. It works if you work it. So work it. You're worth it!
dean- my kitchen sink is clogged, and has been clogged for some time. My trip to europe is coming up in a month and i need to learn some french. I'm sober but feels like i barely am. I'm publishing a book of poetry with my grandfather and the pressure to produce poems or edit my old ones weighs on me. I've been exercising since i got sober but feels like it does little good some days...I have a new guitar student and need to learn a new beatles song every week...Compared to most people these are tasks that are easily completed or whatever, and just feels like i cant do it all or i will not do them right. I know how you feel. blah blah. :)
Timely post for me as that is where I have been stuck for quite awhile. In short I have "lost interest" in the life outside and around me and mostly care about being sober. I have detached from where I use to run wild and free...mostly wild...and am choosing to stay quietly sober although I have a couple of worth while projects and some unfinished business alot of my "stuff" goes into the unfinished business file until either completed or discarded. This is normal for me at the moment. I don't try to justify it with a diagnosis of being dysthymic (long term progressive depression) from the VA alcoholism counsel, or just aging. It seems that left to my own devices I arrive at minimal envolvement. I have no desire to drink again and most of the obessive stuff seems to be gone the drinking dreams and the compulsions. Might be that I need to fill up the holes rather than letting them close on their own? Prayer and meditation on it seems the shortest route to a solution. Prayer and meditation will be it then.
It's not too late to change...especially my attitude.
One of the first things I thought of was Restless Irritable and discontent.But, of course I could be wrong.I can sometimes feel so overwhelmed and most of the time it's my fault.I've taken on more than any human could possibly do and I get mad at myself. I can't do anything until I get off of own case (beating myself up) and do something about it. So, I sit down.Yes, I sit down, with paper and pen and write down everything (I think) I need to do.Then I separate them into 2 columns.1. Things I must (responsibilities/commitments) do and 2. Things that can wait.These are usually things I rather do.That second column is a tough one to be honest with.And my sponsor is always urging me to do the hardest or the one I don't really want to do, first.When I do that the rest of the things do seem to be easier to take care of, because I'm not dreading what's waiting on me.
I also have a problem with perfectionism (Shock!!) and if I know I won't be able or want to do something perfectly I'd rather not do it at all.
I spend so much time thinking about what I need to do, the list ends up getting longer.I too have to say your post is very timely for me.Since, I believe God speaks through others, I've just told myself what I need to do.I hope I was on topic and I also hope I was able to help you in some way
Thanks Dean
-- Edited by Jane05 on Friday 27th of March 2009 04:57:43 PM
This is the right thread for me to have popped into, Dean. Yes, yes, and yes!!
I think for me, in this full life, sober, with a billion responsibilities, I MISS the time when I was first getting sober, and basically convalescing, and taking one step at a time in all my affairs, and "Easy Does It-ing", and absorbing, and all that good stuff. Don't get me wrong, I do not want to go back to that in the sense of being newly recovering, but there are aspects that I miss, a lot more solitude, and folks sure were a lot more GENTLE in their expectations of me!!
Then again, my own feeling of running up a hill coated with grease, is my own, and due to my own expectations, not anyone else's.
Don't know what else to say, but that you are definitely not alone, my friend.
Joni
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~Your Higher Power has not given you a longing to do that which you have no ability to do.
Yuppers!! I know when I get an uneasy feeling, that means that there is something wrong. Maybe not wrong but rather my psyche is bothered by something that I can't put my finger on. Of course, I am comforted and reassured that "this too , shall pass" always saves the day....eventually. When I am "off" I try to practice meditation a bit more, something about that seems to "sort things out" for me. Not sure how, lol but I know I can't get too cerebral on that one! My wife and I were just talking about how we are both so exhausted at the end of the day, for the last couple weeks. Yes, we have had a rough Winter and the lack of sunshine has a negative effect but who knows....I'm sure life would be better if we moved to.....let's say Florida!!! I find I have to gather and collect all of the positive vibes I can to help me through the rough spots. I can be a skeptic...bigtime....but luckily I have been getting a lot of really good info from all my resources, including here.
-- Edited by eastcoastscott on Friday 27th of March 2009 09:52:28 PM
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Holding on to anger is like grasping a hot coal with the intent of throwing it at someone else; you are the one who gets burned. ~Buddha
yup st pete....been there, done that, and doing it now too.....maybe its the moon phase?......lol.....dunno....
for me right now....its realizing, i cant recreate things from my past, even the times that were good.....tried to step back into an old situation like ive done with it alot of times.....its just not the same.....too many things had happened....the innocence, trust, ect.....is gone for me.....
point of it.....i cant hold onto the past, try to recreate it, thinking it will be different this time......
the old saying.....one foot in the past, and one in the future, i pee all over today.....
Missed this one...little late but oh well... Hope things are better today Dean!!!! Try feeling this way "MONTHLY" Hahaha Cant quiet put your finger on the why of things...look at the calendar...and "Ah ha " moment for me kicks in!!!
Hang in there and know you are sooo loved!!!!
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"We tend to forget that happiness doesn't come as a result of getting something we don't have, but rather of recognizing and appreciating what we do have. "
Do you ever feel like you or life is in slow motion and you want to scream? It's hard to explain, but something like the feeling of standing on railroad tracks, watching the oncoming train, and feeling paralized. It's been a long time, but I started to feel like that lately a couple days. It usually happens when my head is trying overwhelm me by throwing up multiple task lists and some judgmental stuff like "you're not getting enough done...". It's an exercise in expectations of self gone awry, coupled with some numbness and impending doom.
Did it pass yet?
That is the thing about that kind of feeling. You have to know it will stop, and you can make it too. As long as it is n't a deeper kind of class of depression. I like the Lord's Prayer, or 23rd Psalm. Both puts it into perspective when overwhelmed with baloney stuff in life.
Missed this one...little late but oh well... Hope things are better today Dean!!!! Try feeling this way "MONTHLY" Hahaha Cant quiet put your finger on the why of things...look at the calendar...and "Ah ha " moment for me kicks in!!!
Hang in there and know you are sooo loved!!!!
thanks Lani, I've got a monthy thing too called the Full Moon!
