Breaking point?

I’m in a not so happy place right now. It seems the high levels of stress I was experiencing over the summer have unfortunately followed me up north. That wasn’t quite the plan.

Currently a lot of things are gnawing away at my self-esteem, vying for my attention and preventing me from making the most from this experience. If I was a Christian I would say God was testing me.

Yet in a very non-Christian way it would be fair to say my faith is currently very low. Faith in the future – and mine in particular – is hard to come by. So I turn to one of my most trusted forms of therapy – the blog. Take a glance back and it is no coincidence that these past months have seen some pretty hectic blogging activity on my behalf. When things are going well there is little need to justify yourself in writing.

I’m not sure how I will get out of this one to be honest. Melodrama aside the next four weeks are going to be ugly – at best.

The temptation to down tools and just pack it all in and is frighteningly strong. Yet the shame involved would be to much to bare.

If I sit down and think things through – then I know this feeling is just temporary. I oscillate between supreme confidence and paralysing fear with an unhealthy frequency – and even while this may be a particularly prolonged and nasty low I know that in the future there will come the counter balancing high. I just have to try and get that far.

I am perhaps squandering slightly as I find this new pond of mine infinitely larger than my last – but I am slowly adapting and growing – in the future it shall require even larger ponds to throw this little fish into such disarray. And that is precisely why I came here – so I should take heart.

‘Should’ being the operative word. Promises of far away rewards offer small comfort to me now.

I’ve tried getting out of town for the weekends – twice now – and each time was something of an anti-climax. I have dragged my classmates out for drinks – and this has only provided temporary relief. I still end up back at square one with my mind awash with anxiety and self-doubt – making any moves to do some desperately needed study almost pointless.

It is hard to focus when there is a war of attrition being fought inside your head. One by-product of all this is a great excess of anger. Most of this is directed at myself – yet I am only human and find it far more convenient to deflect some of it onto more abstract things – like religion for example. Anger can be a great motivating force but it is also a costly one – draining all mental and physical reserves in double quick time.

I just need to step back and find some clarity – then I need to press on and do the impossible – work my way out of this mess on bloody step at a time. In the meantime should anyone wave a bible under my nose and suggest it might help I shall not hesitate to tell them exactly where they can shove that filthy, homophobic, sexist, racist, degenerate, scruffy looking, truth denying and fascist text.

And for heavens sake will someone tell me that I really REALLY do not need to see X-Files series 3 before getting down to some ‘serious’ work. Honestly.