Melancholia
I am a Melancholic.
This is my nature – to be wistful, sorrowful, morose. It is not on purpose. I do not intentionally make myself sad. It just IS. I have been this way as long as I can remember… Even as a young child, I would greet the day not with a smile, but with a sigh.
Today, I am wondering WHY? What is the point of these feelings? They are here, they are sad, they are ongoing, they never disappear. What is the reason this excess of sad emotion exists for me?
No matter how much I have progressed in processing my thoughts and emotions, this sadness does not disappear. It is always present and always persistent. Even when I am existing only Now, it lurks and pops into my mind just long enough to remind me that it is waiting for me.
Sorrow is my oldest friend: it never leaves me, is always patient, and always waiting to embrace me.
I look at other people and I wonder how it is to exist outside of sadness. I wonder how it feels to be completely happy in the light, without this darkness dampening everything.
And, truly, my view of the world has always been gray – all light is matched to dark, all unexpected good must be paired with an expected bad.
I have made my way through this life of mine, navigating the turbulent waters of this sorrow. There are times I have nearly drowned. There are times I can almost leave the water entirely – I soar over rapids and feel light and free. But, always, I am brought back to the water. Most of the time I am rowing my steady rhythm, focusing only on the next stroke and intent on keeping my vessel afloat.
I wonder what it is like to enjoy the sunlight?
I wonder what it is like to have calm waters that flow so easily that one hardly ever needs to row?
I am tired of rowing, but I continue because if I stop rowing, I will stagnate. If I stagnate, I will capsize. If I capsize, I will swim. If I cannot swim, I will tread water. When I am tired of treading, I will float. If I cannot find the strength to float, I will sink. If I continue to sink, I will drown.
I do not want to drown.
This struggle is my existence – I dwell in pain and grief and wishful thinking. I ask myself, “Why me?”
I think the answer is, “Because there is nobody else.”
And, that has been the recurring theme of my experiences – the only one I can depend on to save me from drowning is myself.
I am the only one who has ever saved myself from drowning, using any means necessary to escape these dangerous waters of my mind long enough to regain strength. But, those means I take become new obstacles in the water, because help only comes as a massive rock with sharp edges. I can only cling to it so long before it begins to cause injury.
Sometimes I head out on the water thinking I have enough strength, but I quickly realize that the river flows just as strongly – I cannot navigate the currents with partial strength.
But, where does strength come from?
I feel like I must have strength and endurance because I have existed this long. But, is that just survival? I have not Lived for very long at all, because most of my life has been Survival.
And, even now, I only Live when I can keep myself above the water long enough to recognize that the water and I are separate. I still Survive most of the time, silently plunging forward because there is nowhere else to go but down.
I envy those of you who have people you can depend on and talk to who listen to you without judgment and who care about your feelings more than their own.
You do not have to row so often and you do not live just so that you do not die.
I do not like this existence, but there is no other existence for me.
I live so that I do not die, but I need to Live because I am alive.
Perhaps that is the point – I continue to run from death because I know it will one day claim me and I refuse to allow this.
There were times in my life that I welcomed death, but it did not come for me. Because, even as I drowned, I reached toward the light.
So, the point of this struggle?
That I learn to live in the Light, even as the Dark reaches for me.
Maybe I will never reach the Light… but, I will not give in to the Dark.