Avoidance, Anger, & Angst

My mind has been in avoidance mode for many months now. Actually for a couple of years. When I find living to be overwhelming, I do something that keeps my mind distracted. I know this is not the most effective strategy for dealing with difficulty, but it's the strategy that I've used unconsciously for some time now.

It used to be that I read voraciously to distract myself. When I feel like it, I can read at least one and possibly two novels in an evening. Yes, I'm that fast. But for some reason, I haven't been as much of a reader for almost four years, except for about six months in a row in early 2008. The rest of this time I distracted myself with either highly detailed fantasy lives or the internet. And now, all I do is the internet. And sometimes the TV. I don't even go looking for new things on the internet anymore. I don't spend time looking at comics and LOLcats and YouTube videos. It's as if my mind has become the Sahara, almost totally devoid of life.

Currently, I'm avoiding everything. I'm avoiding the pain and grief of loss. I'm avoiding an ungodly amount of anger. And I'm avoiding a paralyzing amount of anxiety. Overwhelmed? Understatement.

I haven't done my therapy homework this week and tomorrow is therapy. And I'm not going to do it at this point. I was going to skip or phone in a post again, but I decided to at least put some effort in here.

I have a good friend whom I talk with, and lately we've discussed how I'm feeling, what I'm doing (or not doing). He is a fixer and always has many suggestions for what I should or could do. Given that he is a successful entrepreneur, a former jock, and a complete go-getter, what he says makes sense to him. He has seen the success of what he is suggesting.

I'm none of those things, and my track record leaves me with a feeling of impotence. For so many of the important things in life, I have a great deal of evidence that my own actions have little or no effect. I might as well flip a coin. Feeling helpless makes me anxious.

You know I'm trying to make this an anonymous blog. I don't want this traceable to my self because I don't want to deal with professional repercussions, or even some personal ones. I'd rather not have to worry about being judged by what I might say here.

Given than, I find that trying to be less detectable is making me less detailed. So, I'm going to at least be real. If not named. As if those who I know don't already know this is me.

Crap, my writing is getting a bit unclear. So, I'll end now and continue with Anger tomorrow.

Thanks for listening.