Flatness Isn't Sadness

I’ve been experiencing something new recently.

It’s been… strange. And it hasn’t always been easy to spot.

It’s worn familiar masks at times.

Frustration, overwhelm, flatness.

Masks I know all too well.

But beneath all that was this quiet whisper through my nervous system.

The realisation that I’m not bracing quite so hard anymore.

It’s almost sent shivers through my body at times.

As I stood in the kitchen this morning, I realised that today can be whatever I want it to be.

And my first feeling was flatness.

Then came frustration.

Then came the whisper.

Go and do something different.

This is unfamiliar.

And then a moment of clarity.

Flatness isn’t sadness. This can change.

So I listened to my body.

And it asked me for exercise.

Holy shit we can workout!

I moved.

And then I listened to my mind.

“Let’s go and exist in a new space”.

I decided I’d like to go and sit in a creative cafe for the first time.

Not for aesthetic, but because I feel I should start inhabiting the spaces I want to exist in.

Sat on the train, I felt calm settle in my body.

This is what it used to feel like after exercise, I remembered.

I walked past the office building I worked in just before this recovery arc started.

My body remembered the pain that shot through my body as I used to hobble here from the train station.

I took a moment to sit in the fact that it doesn’t hurt quite so much these days.

My mind remembered the crippling anxiety. The layers of tension and internal conflict that wove their way through my experience of myself as I struggled to keep myself above the water.

How did I live like that?

And then I reflected on today.

As I sat and typed between mouthfuls of cheese toastie, thinking about what to work on.

I listened to my mind.

And then I ate a chocolate brownie.

And then I heard myself say it…

This is what it feels like once you’ve touched peace.

You’ve come a long way, sad boy.