SLOWING DOWN

 May 12th, 2026

May has been forcing me to slow down. I suppose that reality has been looming over me for some time, however, it has not been until recently that life has felt unbearable, and I'm drawing back on a lot as a result. 

I felt like I was crawling out of my own skin over this weekend. A buzzing feeling inside of me that couldn't be silenced, and was only further irritated by analysis, loud noises, strenuous efforts, etc. 

It's not the sort of discomfort that I could push, achieve, goal-set, analyze, ruminate, or refine away - and trust me, I have tried. I'm coming to terms with the reality of my own limitations, and for a person who is open about knowing her limits and sticking to them, I'm not taking it very well. At first, I thought I was overstimulated. After deep cleaning my room, re-arranging my furniture, cleaning my car, clearing my wardrobe, cleaning out my camera roll, and so on, I found myself living in cramped quarters. But this time, it's not because my dwelling spaces were messy - just that my brain was. Still is. 

Which is why we're back to the drawing board here. There simply isn't another way out (that I know of). 

I am skipping the gym for the better part of this week. I simply cannot be bothered to work out, and even if my mind wanted to push through, I'm not sure my energy reserves would agree. I am simply too depleted to do, so I must be for a bit. I used to be good at doing that, Taurus moon like me. 

Now, life is a series of tweaks, strategies, and questions on how I can improve in order to give myself a future that doesn't remind me of a past that's long gone, and a present that is reminiscent of all that. 

I once saw a video that said that avoidants live in the past and anxious individuals live in the future - and that's perfect for my very disorganized attachment. I'm constantly trying to be everywhere at once, and that makes it so I do not enjoy my own presence very much. Clearly I'm bursting at the seams now. 

Maybe I have been for some time, but it's catching up to me, and I don't have the wherewithal to stuff it back in. So I have to expel and disperse all of that anguish somehow. 

I'm not quite a full-on minimalist, but I've inching towards that. Slowly but surely. 

I joined my local recreation center (a YMCA) - and I'm resuming my swimming lessons. This time, I'll probably wear a bathing suit instead of being covered from head to toe. I also saw the opportunity to join a 5K walk/race. I'm ready to do it. 

I was watching a show, and the person on the screen said:

You get what you want in life, you get what you visualize. 

And for whatever random reason, I can visualize myself completing a 5K. I can also visualize myself having a net worth of $500K. The same way I can't visualize myself with this man I am seeing - his energy just doesn't register. I can visualize myself in a creative and fulfilling career, and even though my current reality doesn't exactly align with any of these things, and maybe those are all good places to start. I'm going to ask myself this question now, when I embark on new paths:

Can I visualize this?

That'll be my North Star.

I was struggling to write for a while, but now that I'm slowing down, I can think. 

My therapist asked me to do some gratitude exercises, so I guess I'm grateful I wrote this entry.

- vetiveroil