Did you ever have one of those days, or maybe it even bleeds into a week, where you are having such an intense inner dialogue with yourself that you just can’t bear the intrusion of everyday life interrupting that thought process? It’s not that you don’t want people around, or that you are intentionally being dismissive if they are, its just that you are so wrapped up in the overwhelming conversation in your head that any interruption brings your intense thoughts to a grinding halt, making you have to start the entire process over again in your head. Unfortunately, the frustration from that disruption escapes in conversation as rudeness or disinterest. This is a problem, especially if you desperately need a mental retreat, but you also want to keep those you love around you.
These are the times where I personally can’t verbally express exactly why I’m distant and I can’t put my finger on what is wrong with my disposition, but its almost as if I were a computer and I’m in the middle of an ‘install.’ If I’m interrupted I have to go all the way back to the beginning, I can’t pick up where I left off. This is why this mood can last a day, or a week depending upon how many things distract me from untangling the web that is in my head.
In all honesty the string of abundant details that I am trying to unravel are usually trivial but for some reason the pile-up can cause a bit of a standstill from which I struggle to move past. Somewhat like driving down a highway at night, in a downpour, with headlights blaring at you from the opposite lanes. Between the rain and the lights, the guided roadway marks become increasingly difficult to follow. Instinct makes me lower the radio, halt conversation and put the wipers on warp speed to concentrate better on the road ahead… For sanity sake, I presume, quite like that analogy, when I’m overwhelmed I instinctually retreat and set a course to rapidly resolve at least half of the unfinished business in my life, to free up room to focus more clearly on life itself.
I think this happens to a lot of us, and I think that maybe when we come across someone who seemingly has a million things to be thankful for yet they still come off as distant to down right miserable, they too are in the middle of a reboot. Maybe I should consider myself lucky, in that I always eventually find a way to power through the obstacles in my mind and thankfully see my way to clarity. This isn’t at all an excuse for ‘cranky’ behavior, but it is an attempt to explain that when I fall into that mode, its not personal, its just a momentary abyss that I need to dig out of quietly and deliberately. We’ve become an ever-increasingly noisy society, both visually and audibly. Maybe ‘shutting it down’ is a defense mechanism of sorts. Soothe the frazzled mind, if you will.
Anyway, thanks for patronizing my self-analyzation. Putting it on paper and unraveling the mystery of me, I must say is liberating. One step closer to undoing the quagmire that is life 🙂
Its All So Clear to Me Now 