I think that many people have gone through phases in their life where they are intently focused on their mental health. We may download a meditation app, go for a mindful walk, or clean up our living space. “This is it’, we tell ourselves as we get a breath of fresh air and we feel lighter and more grounded. “This is finally the time I take my mental health seriously”. We decide that it’s time to start loving ourself.

Being in love with yourself is like being in love with a romantic partner in many ways. It requires effort to ask questions and be curious. It’s not enough just to ask the questions, but you have to care about what you hear in response. “How are you feeling today?” “What is bothering you?” “What can we do to make it easier?” You need to be asking yourself those things as much as you are asking your romantic partner.

When you stop asking or stop caring, maybe that means you’re falling out of love with yourself….and I think that’s ok. Relationships ebb and flow like the tide. In the same way, our relationships with ourselves can do the same. And, much like a romantic relationship, the external stressors play a major part in this process. The one currently getting to me the most is the drive to increase my productivity.

We are surrounded by the constant push to be increasing our productivity and optimizing the amount of work that we can get done…and why wouldn’t we be? We live in a world powered by human labor. If we decide to step out of life and start worrying more about intangibles, the whole system begins to fall apart. To a degree, human suffering is a requirement of our current system.

In my own life, the holes in my calendar is no longer an intentional choice and time that I have to better myself…it is a gap that is “open” to be filled with other things that are deemed more important: more hours for internship, more open time to tackle my every growing inbox of emails and texts, more time to work on homework, more time to read my textbook. There is nothing to be gained from time spent doing nothing, and therefore, time spent doing nothing is a waste.

Time that I used to treasure where I would sit with a quiet mind and be present in the space around me is now replaced with a frantic rush to refresh my email account to ensure I am addressing all the emergencies or of my social media feeds to keep my brain engaged long enough to not have to think about the mounting wall of stress that looms over me.

The mounting wall of stress is one that I know I must surmount if I am to find my center of gravity for mental health again…but I’ve been in this spot before. I’ve been running from responsibilities and my feelings countless numbers of times and I thought I had gotten better only to be back here again. It’s embarrassing to feel like I have gotten to a point of permanent growth and triumph over my stressors only to be sitting here again, trying to make a new plan for the millionth time.

In moments like this, the logical part of my brain starts to take hold. Rather than trying to fight it, what if I just give up? Maybe I just allow myself to wallow in this feeling of helplessness and keep running away from my problems. If I accept that I’m just a miserable POS, maybe I can stop disappointing myself.

And then, moments like this happen; I feel a wave of realization. I see with fresh eyes what I have been running from and the impact that it has been having on me and I decide that a change needs to happen. I run to my nearest word processor of choice and start mashing the keyboard, trying to get all these feelings out of my head before the clarity drifts away like smoke on the wind.

Here, in this moment, I am deciding to give caring another shot. I’m going to try and fall in love with myself again. I am going to start waking up and deciding to live my days for myself. I am going to stop asking what is expected of me or what the perfect student would do every single day and instead ask myself what I need. I will reach these milestone moments of my life, like my graduation at the end of next semester. That does not mean I need to hold my breath and let the world crumble around me while I do it.

I know none of this information is revolutionary; you have likely heard this all before in one way or another. You may have actually heard a lot of this information from this very blog…but I’m back on my bullshit. My goal is to walk across the graduation stage with my chin up, shoulders back, and a feeling of triumph, not survival. Day 1 of the rebuild starts now.