I've been thinking about how I am turning 32 next month, which is strange and hard to fathom for me. I still feel, on some levels, much younger than that - though I have my "feeling old" days as well. Mostly I've been thinking of what I want for my birthday and what changes I would like to see in my life by this time next year. I emailed my sister this week to tell her that I would most likely not be taking the trip down south that I hoped to this year. Due to a funds snag (long story), I don't see myself taking any major airline trips this year and I'm really sad about that. I miss my NC friends and I haven't seen my sibling or nephews now in about 3 years. And of course, this rules out other trips, too. Not that I thought I'd be running off for a major vacation, but I like it when that's at least a possibility.
I have also been thinking about where I thought I would be at this point in my life. In a great many ways, I am at peace with who I am now. But in others, I am not where I hoped I'd be - emotionally/mentally, financially. One of the big things for me lately has been my obsessive worrying about the state of my dreams. Since I was eight years old, with very little inconsistency, I have wanted to be a writer. Sometimes I wanted to be a poet, once or twice I thought I might be a journalist and more often than not I want and have wanted to be a novelist. All roads lead back to words on paper for me. Or on the computer screen seeing as how the world has leaned that way, toward lit in cyberspace. A lot of my most recent conversations with my therapist revolved around the fact that lately, I mostly just write for myself. Even the novel I've been working on for...well, awhile, has not been seen by anyone else in some time now. My therapy assignment for the next few sessions is to work on this. To work on me and on my joy and well-being. Most importantly, the ways in which these things are connected so deeply to words and writing. There are three things I want before the end of April: an agent, a circle of writers/readers from whom I gain feedback and a completed screenplay. That last one is part of my participation in Script Frenzy, which I am looking forward to.
By the end of three months, I would also like to have begun writing poetry again and I would like to have been to a couple of open mics. I wouldn't mind attempting reading at one, in fact, if I can get up the nerve. But I just have a desperate need to get out there more. It probably is partially due to the change in seasons. As the months get warmer and the days get longer, I find myself restless more often. This is a pretty typical pattern for me. I'm trying to curb some of my less appropriate restless urges by catering to some of the more understandable ones.
Recently, I went to a hypnotist on the (yes, sorta kooky) recommendation of my therapist. It was an interesting experience and different than what I expected. My expectation was, I suppose, that I would walk into this office and there would be some tinkly new age music and incense burning. And then there would be some hippie guy with glassy eyes who would hypnotize me. Instead, it was a nice, normal looking office and the receptionist led me to a room where I watched a video of my soon-to-be hypnotist as he introduced himself - an attempt to put clients more at ease before meeting him in person. It was slightly helpful, but I am pretty much a ball of anxiety no matter what. He was nice, though and except for a very soothing voice, he was not at all what I was expecting. Did hypnosis work? I think for a time, it did. I felt more relaxed and at peace when I left his office than I had in a long time. If I had the privacy and motivation to do maintenence I might have seen more results - I'm not sure. Anyway, I go back in a week for "reinforcement." It's all very strange, I know and I feel a little wacko for it. But I think if it ultimately makes a dent in the anxiety I tend to walk around with on a regular basis, it is worth feeling like a freak.
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