I was looking for a new monthly quote to write on my highlighter-green RoseArt whiteboard I’ve had since 7th grade. The board can only hold about one line of inspiration. I started copying Vanessa after seeing her trendy Instagram posts with the blurred background, the oft-quoted Office lines, and modern-day board.

I looked at it as something like a theme or motto for the month until we moved into the next month. It was something to stare at as a reminder of a different way to look at things. Or not. Hell, it could just be a reminder of my reality. Or, what I interpret to be my reality.

I’m not one for inspirational quotes and have never felt comfortable with affirmations. They’ve always felt like a lie. This comes as no surprise, but I lean more toward the depressing yet very real Charles Bukowski. Yes, he was a chauvinist, a misogynist, and a sexist. “He treated objects like women, man.” Okay, different “-ski,” but he would not be a poet you’d expect me to love reading knowing me and knowing who he was.

Last month’s whiteboard quote was “Poetry is what happens when nothing else can.” And that’s why I love him. People write [poetry] to make sense of the world around them, to make sense of themselves and their feelings, and to express that in the written word so when someone else comes along, they can experience the writer’s experience. You write when you can’t do anything else. It gives you a sense of control, of power, especially when you’re feeling the opposite.

I wanted to use the line, “Sometimes you climb out of bed in the morning and you think, I’m not going to make it, but you laugh inside — remembering all the times you’ve felt that way.”

I really wanted to put that on my RoseArt whiteboard, especially two weeks ago. When I needed to read it and reread it until the words looked foreign and blurry and I didn’t know what I was reading any longer. Like when you’re spelling a word and it looks unnatural, or like you spelled it wrong. It doesn’t look English anymore. That. 

But my whiteboard has so much space and I write like an elementary school child learning their alphabet. I need short lines that barely squeeze into the white space.

This month, September, I wanted to be a tinge more positive to, I don’t know, not hate myself and life so much. I sound like I did when I was 18 and thought the world was against me, I know. I guess this time around, I’m less angsty and more just sad and tired, and like, I have something weighing me down constantly. Some days I can handle the weighted blanket feeling. It’s never cozy like a real weighted blanket. It doesn’t make me feel safe and snuggly.

Instead, this sensation (aka chemical imbalance) feels overbearing, as if I’m wearing a weighted hoodie or one of those Snuggies. The hood’s over my head, pressing down on my cranium, forcing my head to lower. It’s on my shoulders and across my chest and over my legs, pushing all its grey force on me. And I don’t always have the energy to keep moving with this mass.

Sometimes, it’s too much. 

That’s what happened a couple of weeks ago. The feeling got to be too much and I couldn’t keep pushing it away. Like when you’re lifting weights and the entire goal is to lift to failure. And you’re on that final rep, struggling to fully extend or contract or hinge, and your body goes limp. The weight drops. You’re nearly shaking from exhaustion. You have to sit down because the weight became unbearable. 

There was no poetry writing for me. I could do the bare minimum which meant working and getting in some movement. Some mornings, I’d wake up, hope the day would be better, and immediately turn around, climb into bed, bury myself in my blanket, and cry. I didn’t want to move. And I sure as hell did not want to be alive if it meant feeling like there was no point in anything I did. That it was all for naught. That I was alone, “fighting this battle” by myself. I couldn’t turn to anyone because I didn’t think they’d care.

After several days, the weighted blanket lifted. The narrowed vision expanded and I could see colors and smiles and light again.

I’m very fortunate to have friends who understand what it’s like to go through those “episodes.” They invited me to dinner when I didn’t want to go. They invited me for coffee after it lifted. We talked about it. And they understood.

My therapist told me I needed to learn the skills to ask for help when I need to. We’re working on it. I grew up in a family where you “pulled yourself up by the bootstraps.” Crying was for bleeding wounds, not for emotions. There was a lot of anger in my house growing up. And no one talked about depression or anxiety or going to therapy or needing medication. 

And when you grow up like that, you kind of struggle to ask for someone to hold space for you so you don’t have to feel so alone when you’re in Marianna’s Depression Trench, too tried to dig yourself out. Too melancholy to ask for a shovel.

For September, I chose Mary Oliver’s quote, “Don’t hesitate. If you suddenly and unexpectedly feel joy, don’t hesitate. Give into it.” My therapist and I have been talking about doing more things that bring me joy.

When she first asked me, “What brings you joy?” I couldn’t tell her. I just sort of looked at her with a blank stare, rummaging through my brain, trying to come up with some kind of answer. “Riding my bike brings me joy… when I’m not making myself feel bad for not reaching some goal…”

She told me I needed to do more things without an expectation put on them. But when you’re a perfectionist who also has PTSD, there’s always an expectation for anything you do. My goal could be “go have fun riding your bike,” and if I realized I wasn’t having the most fun ever, then I feel like I’ve failed.

We also talked about “fun” and that I don’t get enough of it. I don’t “play enough.” Again, she asked what can I do to be more playful? I was like, “I don’t know, biking?” I struggled to come up with things that sounded “fun” or “playful.” “Playful” sounded like a word a child would say, and that’s probably why I don’t have that much fun. 

Maybe I thought too hard about it. Over thought it. But I couldn’t come up with “fun” things. Or playful activities. Obviously, biking, but I know I take the fun out of it by always trying to get better, faster, stronger, more technical, etc. I mean, I like getting “better, faster, stronger, more technical,” but I wouldn’t say that’s “fun.” I enjoy that.

So, that’s why I have the Mary Oliver quote on the whiteboard. To remind myself to give into joy whenever it pops up. To stop always focusing on improvement or goals and to just have fun, as foreign as that may sound. And when I find something I’m enjoying, to embrace that moment.

It’s easy to ignore moments of joy when we don’t live in the present, but in the future or past, instead. Speeding ahead from moment to moment. 

If we’re constantly worried about what went wrong and what could go wrong, we rob ourselves of joy and peace and happiness and all those positive emotions we all desperately want to feel more of. It’s like what Ferris Bueller said, “Life moves pretty fast. If you don’t stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it.”

So, I invite you, dear reader, to stop and look around once in a while. Find those moments of joy and grab hold of them before moving on to the next shiny thing. Who knows, maybe it’ll help us feel a bit less grey.

Thanks to my patrons who make my writing possible. You can become part of our club here:

Become a Patron!