Just Relax! Yeah, Write!

It’s an interesting piece of advice that lingers everywhere…Relax.  Sometimes I can actually hear the word and the intention behind it; usually I’m moving about a hundred miles an hour through and agenda ten miles long.  Lemme tell ya, relaxing isn’t anywhere on that list.  I am a busy mom who has added working outside the home to her list of tasks.  Toss in a few commissions and committees for public service and sprinkle liberally with my desire to actually have a life aside from my duties and there you have it; not a snowball’s chance in hell of relaxing.

This has been the normal alarming pace that I live by. I know it’s alarming, my heart says so. My brain chimes in, too, and eventually they convince the muscles in the back of my neck to make further activity so painful that I must yield.  Yeah, I get tons of stuff done. You want something done, put me on the friggin committee, it will get done.  But does that really matter?

Lately, my girlfriends and I (yes, they are mostly like me - it’s a wonder we can ever meet up) have been contemplating the quality of the life we are leading.  We are questioning the pace that society has set for us; the one we answered to and decided yeah, we’d dance that dance.  Now we are in our mid-forties and beginning to wonder WTF happened to all those advertising promises we believed in to make things better, simpler, prettier… or just right?  What the hell are we working for?  The constant stream of energy required to sustain the life we have built -- the one that was supposed to be so bucolic and fulfilling, so peaceful and enriching, yeah that one -- is kicking our asses week in and week out.  What are we going to do about that?

It’s easy to say, relax; enjoy. Let it go. It doesn’t really matter. Don’t sweat the small stuff…yada, yada, yada, blah, blah, blah.  So who does the child rearing, holiday memory making, birthday parties, social gatherings, school outings, doctor’s appointments, bill paying, grocery shopping, meal preparing, laundry washing, toilet scrubbing, floor sweeping, homework tutoring, garden planting, yard mowing, flower planting, kid hauling, animal feeding, husband tending, career furthering, friend counseling, church going and on and on and on? The opportunities for obligation or some level of involvement are boggling in number and are varied their appeal.  Whether odious or delightful, to me, it doesn’t matter - all of them siphon away energy. Truth be told, some reciprocate and are fulfilling, too. But most, not really.

You see, I am an introvert cleverly disguised as an extrovert.  I can function highly when interacting with others on myriad subjects in any given moment.  I realize a fair amount of success and am often complimented by colleagues on my effectiveness.  I’m a good friend; loyal, supportive and helpful.  However, my batteries aren’t charged by these moments. Mine get charged by being alone. I crave long hours in which to be peaceful and silent so the rapid pace of my action-oriented brain can slow down enough to let my body actually respond in kind.  Sometimes there is a wicked back-lash, the loosened tension unleashing a recoil that can actually create a panic attack. I’m supposed to be moving, supposed to be doing, supposed to be accomplishing and taking care - of everyone. After all, I am the mom, the boss, the one in charge, the one with the plan, the one who thought it through and did my homework.  This is not stated for self-glorification, actually quite the opposite. I must be one of the stupidest people on the planet to keep on keeping on at such a pace when my very nature is yelling for something else.

Reading, watching movies, sipping hot tea, soaking in scented bubble baths, enjoying candle-lit massages, making love, doing yoga, working out, dancing, six beers and two shots of tequila -- are all high on my list for relaxing.  But with any of these my mind is still really active, running like a background program on a computer using up battery power even while being charged.

I needed an answer.  Critical mass came in the form of debilitating depression and anxiety.  It was clear the therapy and meds were not the answer, this was a problem of a different sort.  It took six months to detox and come off the psych meds.  During that time I read nearly twenty novels.  While doing all that reading, I remembered my love for writing. Not journal writing, story writing.  Creative writing.
I sat down at my computer and started writing the kind of story I would like to read. A cross-genre novel with action, romance, mystery, literary overtures, self-exploration.  It was totally unmarketable. It was heavenly.  I wrote 600 pages.

And so, writing has become my best friend, most effective therapy and haven. Through establishing a writing practice I now have the ability to access a zone where the world falls away - almost instantly.  It’s like my own express lane past the road blocks and toll booths that dot the highways crisscrossing my mind. The to-do lists fall away for a time and the muse massages away those pesky “shoulds and should-nots”.  As my fingers flit over the keys, my breathing deepens, slows down and evens out. My heart rate settles to its resting rate and the mental snarls are combed out.  The creative fires are stoked and they burn away the cares and worries that crease my brow.   I was born to write like I was born to breathe air.

Not to mention, it’s just plain fun.