Coming to a GameStop near you: LIFE
I'm slowly coming to terms with the fact that I have pretty bad anxiety and that it has always haunted me; that this feeling I wake up with every day isn't normal; that I get caught up in loops of anxious thoughts and that in my head things are happening much faster than they really need to. I'm always fighting it and telling myself to take a breath and take step one before I take step five and that if I just keep taking steps I'll get to the end in plenty of time, even though it rarely feels like it.
I think it's worst for me when I'm seeking an answer to something or when I just feel unsettled or impatient waiting for all the pieces of a puzzle to reveal themselves. I have this tendency to completely overthink and overanalyze the smallest things when the answer is almost always the simplest one and is staring me right in the face (until it's not, of course, but I should remember that those are rare occurrences and not the rule).
I'm a huge fan of puzzle games. I love working hard at something to find the correct solution and having all the pieces fall into place. I don't do as well if there's a timer though, or if I'm penalized for mistakes; it makes me uneasy and unable to fully focus on the task at hand. I work best if I have fewer constraints to be able to think creatively towards a solution. I keep forgetting this when it comes to life. For some reason I have it in my head that there is only actually one correct solution to every one of my problems, and that if I get too many of them wrong I'm going to have a miserable life. I put time constraints on myself unnecessarily and I beat myself up for making mistakes. I'm 30 and I don't own a house yet, and I probably won't be in a position to do that by myself for another 10 years. I'm also divorced and still living in the city where I attended college. All of this sounds like the complete opposite of where I expected to be in life even just a few years ago. Does this mean I'm wasting my one shot at life? Am I doing literally everything wrong?
The reality, as scary as it is for me to admit it, is that there is no one right answer and there is simply no guarantee that terrible things won't happen in my life. I hold on too tightly to the idea that if I just do everything perfectly I'll get it right and win a prize at the end of my life or something. It's ridiculous. I see how preposterous it is written down. And yet, it still feels true to me even as I'm refuting the "logic" of it. Maybe it has something to do with growing up in a Christian household - be a good enough person and you get to go to heaven at the end. (Disclaimer: I am not here to tell anyone what to believe; I think that if your beliefs empower you and don't lead to hatred then we can all get along just fine.) Personally, I don't believe in the teachings of the Bible anymore and maybe it has left me with a distorted view of how I need to live to be happy and successful. Maybe part of this anxiety is lingering guilt for not believing in the same things I did growing up.
This unhealthy idea of how to live - this obsession with never making a mistake - has been driving me all my life. Maybe I really did just watch too much TV as a kid. After all, everything is always okay at the end of the show, right? So everything must work out that way in my real life too. We as the audience get to know when the main character in our favorite show is making a mistake that will make everything more difficult, so someone somewhere must know when I'm making those mistakes...I just can't see them myself. Maybe someone is screaming at their TV right now to me "NOOoooo, don't do that! You're ruining it!"
But there is no one correct answer. There is no one perfect way to live a life. We really are free to make any decisions we want, we just have to understand that those choices have consequences - known or otherwise.
It's that "otherwise" part that makes me anxious. I have no idea where my decisions in life will lead me and there is no game guide to tell me how to make it through this level in my game/life. This should be freeing, and sometimes it does feel that way. Unfortunately most of the time it's terrifying and I bury my head back down in whatever problem I've convinced myself is the most important thing to worry about it my whole damn life.
So if I had to write myself a game guide for how to get through this level in Life (this level, called "My Thirties"), I suppose it would have to look like this:
1. Breathe
2. Keep breathing
3. Choose people who make you happy and make room for them in your life.
4. Choose a job that stimulates you and makes you feel good about yourself.
5. When those things stop making you happy, and you've done your best to make it work, pick another one.
6. Don't beat yourself up; life will do enough of that for you.
7. Do your best to live life within your means and stop sweating the timing and the mistakes.
8. Speaking of sweating, you really are one workout away from a good mood most of the time...even if that "workout" is literally taking half an hour to walk one mile on the treadmill.
9. Just do your best every day; you are only competing against yourself.
10. Breathe
11 - ∞. Keep breathing
What would you add? And what's the best piece of advice you've ever been given? I'd love to hear your thoughts (because mine are clearly scrambled right now 🙃)