The other evening my anxiety alarm had me up at like 3am. I laid in bed tossing and turning and just couldn’t get comfortable so I finally conceded to looking at my phone which is always the worst possible thing to do if you want to go back to sleep.

I went over long jump film, thought about my approach, went over other jumpers film and just leaned into the chaotic noise my brain was pumping out.

I ended up on my own Instagram page and was going through old posts. Recently, I’ve just been tired yall. Too tired to read other people’s long captions, and definitely too tired to write them. (Some of my posts from just a few years ago were thoughtful and deep af tho)

Since the pandemic hit, I’ve been feeling like I’ve been stuck in a very boring, dark and quiet void. 2019 was an exciting year for me, stressful in its own way, sport was falling apart but I had creativity to help anchor me to who I feel I am.

When the world ends, we always picture it as an abrupt and final ending. A period at the end of a sentence. My experience during COVID and consequently the constant bombardment of racial injustice was not a final, significant moment. It was more like an ellipses rather than a period…..

Like not being able to catch my breath. Like missing the last step at the end of a staircase. Any distraction was welcome because at least my brain could grab onto something which is better than absolutely nothing. Even while writing this, I’m on a plane ride home and the unwelcome interruptions of the attendant trying to explain safety protocol I find derailing.

*Shut up shut up shut up shut up shut up*

My creativity has hit an all time low with an impressively long duration. I haven’t felt any profound thoughts or emotions that have pulled me to write or create until very very recently. And it comes in snapshots…. and leaves just as quickly as it arrives if I don’t immediately make a point to write it down.

But I guess the best part that even in a fleeting moment, it’s a glimmer of hope. It’s seeing that while our brains can’t actually process this amount of stress, it is adapting and surviving and finding ways to dish out some comfort in a new way.

I’ve lost A LOT of faith in what I’ve built for myself over the years from this event. I got a job I really don’t need because I was afraid all my work had just… disappeared. Everything I’d worked towards just seemed to drop down through a trap door. Feeling like it didn’t even leave a trace of evidence that it ever existed.

The faith was gone. A perfect shape to be filled by fear, uncertainty, textbook anxiety yada yada yada.

Hopelessness isn’t as fleeting in the moment when it seems that things floated away rather than were ripped from you.

A good dramatic ending is better than a boring one, right? And whewwweeee if we’ve learned anything it’s that while a pandemic is terrible and dramatic; for the majority of us it’s pretty boring.

Boring is boring. Drama is exciting.

My creativity and hope weren’t blown out like an excited toddler attacking a birthday candle but rather faded away when no one was looking, when no one noticed or cared until after the moment had passed. The smoke had passed. No sign of the flame existed at all.

But the spark is still there. It’s dormant. It’s resting. But it is still flammable and when it’s ready

🔥

This isolating feeling is important for me to finally recognize and assign words and a place to exist. Mostly just for myself but also for those I know are feeling the same. This year has been hard for so many reasons.

For the privileged few like myself though, it’s felt uncomfortable at worst. People can endure pain, because we have painted that as a noble thing. But discomfort or dullness, is excruciating. It’s stifling. It kills creativity and hope and motivation and I will be the first to admit that I am not immune to boredom.

I’m grateful for these few and far moments of life re igniting somewhere deep inside of me again. Like a feeling of deep laughter building and even though it still passes, it’s building velocity. I can feel it. I’m excited for it and I welcome it.

If any of this resonates with you, please know, you are not alone, but I think more importantly you are not stuck here forever.

Even if the moment comes, and you can’t grab it as it passes, it’s still a sign of a new horizon, a new day, a new light peaking above the dark and welcoming itself to join you.

Being human is complicated. Progress is not linear. And life isn’t really about winning.

We exist with and for others, just as they exist with and for us.

And maybe, just maybe, in really super hard and terrible times…. it’s good to just be enough. ♥️

L.