Trying To Not Lose My Sanity In The Midst of An Existential Crisis

Hey Siri, play “Alright” by Kendrick Lamar

Yesterday was ROUGH. My goal for today is to not kill myself and that has to be enough because that is me trying my best and that’s all I ever have to do. I have been learning to trust myself and my intuition and holy damn, has it been so difficult to trust the woo woo in life.

I feel like right now in this very moment, I am quite actively just trying to keep my head afloat and that is enough. I have to remind myself that I am only 22! I am just a flower starting to blossom, it’s okay to not have it all together. It’s okay at any age because this human life is hard!

Honestly, I am just a little overwhelmed in trying to be a human and I am trying my best. I like to share pictures of me crying and talk about these difficult times like today because I just want to show people that it is totally okay to be a mess because we are all a mess in our own way. If we keep waiting for that moment that we are perfect then it’s never going to come.

If I would wait to write until I felt that I could get everything out so perfectly then I would never write. If I constantly waited for something to come then its just not going to come because I’m not living in the present moment. I have had to learn to be okay with my mistakes, my grammatical errors, my bruises and all the in between.

My biggest lesson has been unlearning my codependency issues. I relied on others to make me happy, to pull me out of the dark, to make me feel okay in my choices but that never came. So I had to do it for myself and it is what we all have to do. We literally have to learn how to self-soothe to understand that we cannot rely on others to give us what we want. We have to love ourselves unconditionally in order to love others unconditionally.

ME CRYING BECAUSE IT IS NORMAL

We as a society always highlight the triumphs but we never highlight the trials and tribulations that it took to get to that final triumph. So I want to do that for the world. I want to show people that it definitely is not easy making your dreams come true. It is fun and it’s much better than letting people walk all over you, but it is not any easier. And you know maybe I am crazy for following my dreams but then well, let it be that I am crazy because I’d much rather follow my heart than go against my intuition, which only has the best intentions for me because my highest self wants nothing more than to see me succeeding in my journey.

I am just here to show people that it is okay to not have it all together, it doesn’t take away from your ability to accomplish your goals. It is so damn brave to follow your heart because not many people do, most don’t. We are in a time period of awakening so a lot more people are becoming aware to their truest hearts desires. And one day, it won’t be so silly to follow your heart because it’s something that we all must do for a completely fulfilled life.

On a more personal note, I have been STRUGGLING with my choices. I’ve been struggling because I am happy with my choices but my choices include things that go against what the rest of the world is doing. I keep having nightmares about education because well, I decided to take a semester off. And I am trying my best to not feel silly because it wasn’t an easy decision at all. I am just not in a place to support my education and that is okay. I also refuse to do what I did before which was overwork myself into a deep depression because I was trying to work and go to school just to support myself. And contrary to what the norm is, I just can’t do that and it isn’t a bad thing! Sure there are people who think I should just put myself into school but what does it benefit me to add to my level of stress if I then have to worry about building debt? And I refuse to have debt because I have seen what it has done to people and I do not want that for myself. I’m still trying to pay back my last semester, so how it would benefit me to add to that sum of money that I owe? It doesn’t benefit me at all. I would just be more stressed out because then I would be wondering how to dig myself out of that hole. But instead of wondering how to dig myself out, I am just refusing to fall in the first place. And goddammit, that has to be enough for me to be happy with myself because if I’m not happy with my choices then I might as well not live.

BUT THE THING IS THAT I DO WANT TO LIVE. And me wanting to live means I don’t want to suffer like I have seen many others do before. I could apply for loans but that is a route I refuse to go down. And maybe it’s silly but the crazier thing is, what if it isn’t silly at all? What if what I’m doing is exactly what I am supposed to be doing? And I am sure it is because it makes me feel better to follow my heart rather than the heard of sheep digging themselves into a pile of debt.

This all just goes back to my point of self-soothing. Old Alexis would rely on the text messages of her friends to make her feel better about her choices. But what does it matter if anyone is okay with my choices if I am the one who has to live with them? It’s just difficult coming to terms that we really are in fact, in control of our lives. Whether it is good or bad, we have control. We are fortunate enough to be able to create the lives we want. How damn amazing it is to have a roof over our heads, running water, a heater and dryer, Bluetooth accessories to listen to music 24/7, fans to keep us cool in the heat, cameras to capture our loveliest moments, skin to protect our bones, eyes to see, and just freaking the power of our mind.

I am just trying my best to implement all the virtues I have learned. I just ugh the thing is, SO MANY PEOPLE HAVE DIED WITH THEIR DREAMS UNFULFILLED. So many people have died not knowing their worth. Van Gogh, Edgar Allen Poe, Emily Dickinson, Franz Kafkaesque, and so many other great visionaries!!! Let us learn from their lives and just be proud of who we are in the moment. They put out their passions even when people didn’t think much of them. It wasn’t until after they died that we put worth to their work. But why wait until after someone dies to finally listen to what they were trying to tell you the entire time? Sam Cooke was 33 when he was killed. He wrote, “A Change Is Gonna Come” when he was arrested for being Black. The song didn’t gain momentum until after he died. It’s a song that we still play today because holy damn, we are all just waiting for this change to come. But we can’t wait, we have to be the change that we so badly seek. My point being, we take each other for granted. We aren’t grateful for each other when we are alive and it isn’t until after someone dies that we’re like “oh they weren’t crazy, they had great ideas.”

All I am saying is that we need to be the change we so desire so this is me doing my part in my life. I want people to embrace the hard times so here I am, embracing the hard times in my life because every small moment is so significant to the big picture. We can’t just skip from A to Z, we have to learn how to walk first. ow silly would it be for me to expect others to change their beliefs and believe in the power of the universe if I myself am not doing that? What we expect of others is what we must expect of ourselves. I want people to believe in themselves and follow their dreams so here I am, leading the way for myself and others.

And maybe I am so silly for doing this but I don’t think so because I am listening to what others before us have been trying to get us to understand. They left behind their work for us to learn from. So why not be grateful for that advantage? Why not be grateful that thank freaking god that someone before us laid down some type of ground work for us to walk on? We aren’t starting from scratch you know. There’s a reason we are here today now because we have learned to listen to others, but we have yet to listen to them when they tell us to believe in the power of the universe.

This is me, completely raw and open jumping into the unknown and sharing the journey with everyone so that others can learn from my building blocks so that their life doesn’t have to be as difficult. Because to be honest, life is rough but it doesn’t have to be a total shit storm as many untapped individuals make it out to be.

So cheers to those leading the way for others to follow! We can do this, despite what we think, we are in fact strong enough to handle this. 57 years ago today, MLK Jr gave his iconic address at the Lincoln Memorial. Things have progressed but not enough. Black people are still getting murdered for being Black. There is no equality, equity, nothing. But it will change and the change starts within and it starts today, in every present moment.

Here are some things that have grounded me today: