Will I Survive These Dark Times?

"Close your eyes, breathe in for four seconds, hold for six and release for eight.....Now tell me young man, what does the self saboteur look like and why does it want to destroy you"?

These were the words spoken to me on my second visit to a therapist after an agonizing two weeks of sever panic attacks which were essentially paralyzing my life. The cause was the affirmative decision for complete sobriety and the onset of awakenings to all the self destructive mistakes I have made in the past 4 years or so that have kept me academically stagnant, incurring financial losses, damage many family relationships and so on. In a nutshell my decision to finally stop waking up every morning and numbing my brain had me painfully staring into the mirror and seeing that I am actually far off from the person I was working hard to become during my teenage years.

But the fact that I'm feeling this way at 22 years old may seem like I am deluded to others, prompting you to comment the same as my family..."Relax, your still very young...your life has not even started yet"!

Yet the "Self-Saboteur" which in my meditative state I described as a small burning flame continues to rage and consume me. My only hope is that many years from now, given that I still exist on this earth, I may retrospectively look back at this post with a smile, understanding that the fire may consume me but will always grant me the opportunity to rise with a thicker skin and sharper mind like a phoenix from its ashes.

I guess when you grow up being told that your a child of great potential with school and society both reinforcing this statement then achievements become a sort of addictive clutch, however when the unfortunate event of falling out of sync with the 21st century definition of standard progression and where you should be in your early 20's, it become incredibly hard to endure when you go off track.

I get it! There are millions of people in this world FAR worse off than me, without a roof over their head and the anxiety of not knowing when their next meal is....however as much empathy as I have it is difficult to remove yourself from your 'selfish ambitions' and the lack of achieving them, whether its temporary or not.

This quote resonates with me greatly and accurately pinpoints my brain at the moment....in order to not go insane from overthinking and hopelessness, i've been told by my therapist to journal my days, so what better way than to do so on a platform I love, powered by one of the few things keeping me interested in living, the blockchain.