Finding My Purpose

Have you ever felt like you finally grasped this thing called life? Things that never made sense before finally do, and all of the negativity starts to manifest into positivity. And then, just as you're getting used to your new outlook on life, everything on which you worked so hard vanishes. You wake up one day and you seem to have forgotten EVERYTHING that you learned. The fear of reverting back to your old, toxic ways of thinking weighs on you. The more that you think and worry, the more control the fear has. Before you know it, the light that you began to feel has vanished, and the dark, cold, emptiness returns. The negative voices that you thought you had locked away for good are brought back to life. But this time, they seem to be stronger and more aggressive. You begin to wonder what the point of anything is, and you begin to question whether or not you will ever truly feel happiness. You start to see yourself as a problem that cannot be corrected, and you begin to feel like an outcast in your own mind. The negative thoughts envelope you, and before you can fully comprehend whats happening, your days and nights are filled with toxicity and hopelessness. By now, the fear has taken full control over you, and instead of wondering how you will get through the darkness, you forget that the darkness is even escapable.

As I sit here and type these words, anxiety sits on my chest like an elephant. I have to focus on my breathing, and remind myself that I am alive, and I am in control. When I first decided to start this blog in January of this year, I had every ounce of motivation behind me propelling me forward. What you can see is that I have posted a whopping two posts... what you can't see are the drafts saved on this platform, my phone, and even ideas that I scribbled on scraps of paper. I thought that I knew the direction that I wanted to take this blog; I wanted to talk about things that have always made me happy, such as fashion, food, and traveling. After perfecting my first post, I was elated. What I couldn't predict, however, was that it wasn't going to continue being that easy. Life gets in the way, and though I felt like I was in a good place mentally, I couldn't see that I would continue to struggle. Instead of intending to write about the things that I enjoy in life, I should have been focusing more on the things that we all try to avoid feeling and talking about. We all have our own battles, and we all have times when we feel alone. Even though our battles are different, the fact that we are all fighting every single day for our greater purpose, means that we are all actually the same.

A few weeks ago, my husband and I returned from a two week road trip out west. We flew into Denver, and then slowly made our way through Santa Fe, Flagstaff, Lake Havasu City, St. George, and then ended the trip in Las Vegas. I absolutely love the desert and mountains, and being wrapped up in the intoxicating energy that fills the western U.S. was so therapeutic for me. As you can imagine, I was on a constant adrenaline high for a long time. When we came back to Ohio, I instantly fell into a minor depression. Chalking it up to an adrenaline crash, I didn't think much of it at first. However, a few days went by, and I felt the depression tightening its grip. Each day that passed seemed to bring along more darkness. I knew I didn't want to feel that way any longer, but I had no energy to fight it. Instead of fighting, I decided to fully submerge myself into my emotions and try and figure out what the trigger was. I spent a week or so self-refecting and analyzing my thoughts, and I finally figured it out: I was lacking purpose.

In a nutshell, I am not happy with the area in which I am living, I am unsatisfied in my career, I am surrounded by A LOT of negativity, and all of my likeminded friends have taken leaps of faith and are now living elsewhere making their dreams come true. Though moving out west is in the cards for the near future, it isn't happening quite as quickly as I would like. It is true that I am choosing to stay in certain situations, and technically (CAUTION: swallowing large horse pill), I am choosing to continue feeling hopelessness. But what I needed to figure out, was what I could do in the meantime to bring some purpose to my life. As I sat in my own head, I kept thinking about this blog. I kept thinking that there had to be other people in the world who could relate to how I was feeling. Mental health is not something that I typically like to talk about because it makes me feel vulnerable, which, to me, is a super yucky feeling. However, I also understand that behind vulnerability lies the answer to growth, and growth will lead me to the confidence that I will need to find my purpose. I also began thinking, if I could talk about some of the things that no one wants to talk about, and if I could help just one person feel understood and less alone, the purpose would begin to manifest itself.

I am still in the process of coming out of one the worst bouts of depression that I have experienced, and my thoughts are still pretty chaotic. With that said, I hope that this post made sense, and I hope that it can help someone put their feelings into words. I want to make it a point to focus more on this blog, and I have so many more thoughts and feelings to share. Until next time, just remember that you're not alone. You will get through whatever it is that you're going through, and light is always there waiting to follow the darkness.


If you need a reminder that things will get better, take a listen to this...



xoxo


Heather