1. It is a feature of rough times that one feels one should do something.
2. Often this something is precisely what we cannot do,
3. yet feel we should be doing.
4. Because having a rough time is our fault, isn’t it, and if we just did something — namely the things we cannot do — the rough times would go away.
5. Here are some of the things I feel I should be doing, that I cannot do, and that if I only managed to do would (so the story goes) pull me out of this rough time:
- Read that one specific book I am finding very hard to read because it’s so fucking bleak (another book won’t do)
- Watch films (TV shows don’t count)
- Draw on paper (drawing on tablet doesn’t count)
- Sleep in the afternoon (dozing without full sleep is a pathetic substitute which shows what a failure I am).
6. The harder life gets on me, the harder I get on myself.
7. Telling myself to ease up on myself doesn’t work. The adult in me, the internalized mom, is very ill-formed and unable to talk to the child who is suffering miserably.
8. This is why I need analysis.
9. The best I can do right now is tell myself to patiently put up with doing nothing and wrestle the day passively (I cannot wrestle it actively) until nighttime brings respite (which itself, I realize, is a huge blessing).
9. The best I can tell myself is that it will pass and just grit it till then.
inside(r) psychoanalysis 