Where I don’t belong.

Like a loveless marriage, a plucked rose, a crooked frame.

When things don’t align, a horrible picture emerges. Out of place, out of harmony, a sight for sore eyes, a pain for deaf ears.

A heart is still, or beating for someone else. A rose slowly withering. Doing what you don’t want to do, wasting time, energy, and effort.

Burnout comes from doing too much of what you hate. Burnout doesn’t happen when you do much of what you love. Working hard for what you love brings fulfillment. Doubt, resistance, fear, and fatigue will still exist, but it will never be as tiresome and soul-sucking as giving and giving to something you don’t care about.

The answers within.

Our souls, hearts, and minds constantly tell us what they want. When we don’t listen, they only get louder, until one day they disappear. Or do they? No. They never leave. We just turned a blind eye, deafened our ears, caged our hearts, until all we hear are muffled whispers. Ones that may get louder in the dead of the night, upon seeing a flash of something, but are then quickly quieted.

Ones that surface above but are quickly drowned by a sea of distractions, mindless thoughts, numbing actions.

You’ll kill a dream, violently, before it has even seen the light of day, and you don’t expect its ghost to haunt you for eternity? Whether the ghost is real or imagined is up for debate. But then again, just because it’s happening inside your head, doesn’t mean it’s not real.

Nothing will ever be enough.

Restless, empty, hollow. 

Fidgeting, biting your nails to the quick, losing sleep.

Lost in the clouds, dreams of paradise, anywhere but here.

Humans. Human life, emotions, thoughts, and actions. All so complex and constantly evolving yet so very static and boring.

What are we without the one thing our hearts nudge us towards our whole life?

Fill a void with every random thing and it will be nothing but water in the ocean. Fill it with the missing piece and the picture will be as clear as clean water.

Funny how a heart and soul want one thing, and a mind ruins everything, whatever lies outside of this body ruins it all. But then again, what is a love story without all the obstacles standing in the way of fated lovers reuniting?

Would we have ever known the strength of their love if not for the strength of their hardships?

Burnout doesn’t come from hard work.

Burnout doesn’t exist where love does. Love is a powerful fuel, an energy that goes into whatever you do. There is fear, doubt, failure, and fatigue, always. Life is characterized by contrast and polarity. But a mother’s love, a lifelong passion and on the other hand a tiring relationship, a dreadful job can mean the difference between life and death.

Most people think working hard causes burnout. But it’s actually working hard on the wrong thing, because if it does not light up your soul, how will you ever get better at it, how will you become creative or even give it anything more than the bare minimum?

The things we love and that bring us joy don’t require much prompting to do them. We naturally lean into them. That’s not to say the things we’re destined to do will always or ever be easy, or that they’ll always feel good. But you can feel it within you, whether something’s right for you or not.

Anything worth doing will be hard in one way or another. And it will always take time. Would you trust a bridge that was built in a day? When you throw love into the mix, none of this sounds dreadful, overwhelming, or anxiety-inducing. It sounds exciting and maybe it’s tinged with a little fear, a little anticipation. But aren’t all the best things in life a little scary?
A fun rollercoaster ride, a trip to a completely new place, falling in love.

💖 Let’s connect!

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📝 Author’s Note

I feel a very big difference in myself when doing what I believe aligns with me and what doesn’t. Since my everyday life contains both, and I try to give both my all, (blame perfectionism, my love for Dostoevsky, or whatever else) there’s still this gaping difference, in the sense that uncertainty in what I love looks like actively looking for a solution versus dreading it and being anxious. I work hard because I’m a perfectionist and it feels good, but I always feel like it’s not worth it, and since studies ‘objectively’ matter more, they sometimes trample my writing, and I hate that. I always want to be prioritizing this. Because it matters, because it’s the end goal. Because it’s what truly aligns with my being, it’s what’s been there all along.

Leila,

Excerpts from Divine Rivals by Rebecca Ross:

“Roman stood in the sunshine and read every word of her article. He forgot where he was, where he was standing. Where he was going. Where he had just come from. He forgot everything when he read her words, and a smile crept over his face when he reached the end. She was writing brave, bold things. And it had taken him a while, but he was ready now. He was ready to write his own story.”

“I admire you, in more ways than one. Keep writing. You will find the words you need to share. They are already within you, even in the shadows, hiding like jewels.
Yours,
-C”