Hey, how are you all? I’m okay . . . mostly. This is a strange time, yeah? 

If you struggle here and there with anxiety, wrestle with the old ghosts of a traumatic past, or are simply human, you may have noticed your threshold for spiraling into your feelings is a little lower these days. Like, super low. Maybe it’s a little washed out? Could just be me.

On the off chance you’re anything like me and you’ve found yourself gazing into your Crystal Ball of Doom™ a little too often, I wanted to acknowledge a couple things:

1. If you are isolated with someone you love, it’s normal to feel a strain there
2. If you are isolated away from someone you love, it’s normal to feel a strain there

People . . . we are all dealing with a lot of crap right now.

One of the things I know to be true about myself is that when I am feeling strain in one area of my life, it tends to bleed a bit into others. I am not always cognizant of it at the moment, which makes it particularly insidious, so it ends up coming out sideways. Like when I’m hungry and I bang my head on something and burst into tears; I’m crying because I’m hungry, not because I hit my head. Hitting my head was just the proverbial straw that broke my hungry camel’s back. Likewise, when I’m lonely, (or isolated or bored or I ate too many baked goods and my tummy hurts), and someone I love very much does a totally normal thing that perhaps I would ordinarily just let go but in this moment of isolated-tummy-ache-boredom signifies the end of the actual world, that’s my crap coming out sideways.

Uncertainty is not my friend. In today’s world, it has overstayed its welcome. I’m crabby. But while that’s true for so many of us, we can consider the awareness of it a tool of sorts. Because if I know I’m under strain, I also know I’m prone to letting that bleed into areas it doesn’t belong, and knowledge is power.

So I am armed with this knowledge, yes? The knowledge that I am emotionally overextended due to an undercurrent of uncertainty, (strain, crabbiness, tummy aches, what-have-you). I am also armed with the knowledge that awareness of a situation or a feeling is not enough to act on, and that in order for me to be the best version of myself, I need to spend time accepting the situation (or the feeling) so that I can be objective about what to do about it.

This morning I fed the cats. Then my partner came along and let me know he wanted to wash the cat food dish with the morning dishes, so he dumped the cat food back into its box to wash the bowl before filling it back up again to feed them. Ordinarily this would have been an “okay, dude – whatever floats your particular boat” moment – but no, not today. You see, the world is a strange place, so putting the cat food back in its container meant my partner no longer wanted to spend time with me. DON’T LAUGH, I’M BEING VULNERABLE!! But I also knew my Crystal Ball of Doom™ was responsible for that extrapolation, (powerful magic in that thing . . .), so I went into the other room to be with myself for a moment. In the end there wasn’t anything left to feel bothered about. 

In this time of increased uncertainty, when I find myself compelled to react to things in a way I am aware is out of proportion to the situation, I know to take a moment to figure out where it’s really coming from before losing my shit. Because when I pause, I can remind myself that it’s just a really weird time right now, and the dumbest stuff is going to feel bad in ways it usually wouldn’t. Sometimes I end up crying anyway, but at least I’m better equipped to not cause harm by acting out of misdirected feelings surfacing only due to the proverbial straw.

Blaming the straw is never wise. 

Photo by Tim Trad on Unsplash