I feel robbed.
I don’t know where the time has gone. In fact, the time has lost its meaning altogether.
It feels like yesterday when we met my nephew for the first time. I was too scared to hold him because he was so tiny. We welcomed him to the world, we couldn’t wait for him to wake up, to be able to understand us. Although, at the same time, we didn’t want him to grow up too fast.
Now, suddenly, the time that we expected has come, he is standing up, he is awake most of the time, he understands us, and it’s “too late”, he is almost 1 year old now.
While we are living day by day in uncertainty, being stuck in routines, feeding on hopes, and conquering occasional depression, he is the only thing that reminds us of the time. Him, and my mom’s hair, that I noticed is getting grayer.
I used to wonder if anyone else felt the same way, that the concept of time is unfair, that there are just too many other depressing things in this world. Now I know for sure that I’m not alone, but somehow it gets scarier. Being on the same boat with the majority of people in the world makes it more and more real.
I feel stuck. I feel confused. I feel like life is punishing me for some reason. They said I might be gifted, that I was one of the chosen ones, to be able to feel, think, and process things more deeply than the others.
Could it be because I’m waiting for something big and sudden? Like one magic hand from the sky to save and rescue me.. or maybe a relationship, big money, or an event?
Could it be because I think I’m so special that I should have been something big by now? Maybe I think I’m too good or too special to experience the ups and downs that life brings, that I’m too special to not being praised and noticed. That I’m too special to make efforts, even for myself.
Could it be because I haven’t forgiven and accepted what is not meant for me? I have experienced good things, life, and relationships, and I refuse to live unless I get those things back. Even though the fact is, I won’t be aware of the good things unless they are not here anymore. I will always look back and hope I can go back to one point. Because now I know what they were. Because now they are familiar.
Could it be because I’m too scared of the unknown? Because again, if things don’t work out, I will compare them to those that once worked out, that I will think I’m going back to square one, or falling off the cliff. And that, once again, is because I’m still attached to my past and the loss I haven’t accepted and forgiven.
Or maybe it’s because I tie my worth and the success of my days to superficial things, like money. If I’m not making money, my day doesn’t count. Or if I’m not experiencing anything big or life-changing, then my life is boring. Or if I’m back to feeling stuck, then there was no point in living the previous days.
Maybe, it is all of the above. Maybe it’s time for me to reflect, to evaluate the things that brought me here. Not the experience, the place, or the time, but the feeling.
I have been resenting life because I feel punished. I’m feeling like time is an unfair illusion while at the same time accepting that it is too real to torture me.
I think the key to life is adjusting expectations whenever needed. Like, we need to occasionally inspect our standards and the real situations, and make sure the gap between them is not hurting us in any way. We need to know that every chapter needs a different version of us since every chapter comes with a different set of lessons and characters too. My life is just like a TV show where every season is not exactly related to the previous ones.
There are some flashbacks, some backstory to everything I say and do, but then again, they are meant to be acknowledged and forgiven. Every season will turn out different, and me sticking to what I know, the only patterns I have been holding on to for so long, is not helpful.
I have told myself repeatedly, that even though I feel robbed by the concept of time, by how stuck I have been feeling, I have lived a few different lives in a lifetime. Wouldn’t I feel more stagnant and stuck if I were to live one predictable life?
I just thought of one more thing, add this to the list; maybe I feel confused and stuck because I expect every chapter to be predictable, to be familiar and comfortable, but somehow I perceive predictable as boring. Like, I have experienced this, I should be experiencing something new. I want full control when I know that wanting control was probably the reason why I was not going anywhere. Wanting control turned into fear, anger, resentment, and disappointment toward life. I became afraid of embracing the unknown.
And what does stuck mean exactly? If not staying in one place and not being able to move anywhere? Did I voluntarily stay in one place, then keep bitching about it?
Okay, this is me overthinking things. But now I know that if I want to live without attachment and live freely, I need to understand all of those things above. Consistently and fully. I need to stop perceiving time as a threat, and money as a rope that ties me up. I need to move on and be open to every new experience, without looking for a similar pattern from the past, without wanting to control everything. Every day is a new day, and thinking they are just another day is what makes me feel stuck. That, and waiting for that one day where my life flips over in one second.