Back on the Horse

The only constant in our lives is change.

And honestly, that’s the way it should be.  If we stay stagnant for too long, we’re not growing, or stretching, or reaching our ultimate potential.

But change can be messy.  It can come when we’re not ready for it.  And it can hurt like a bitch. 

I’ve spent the last month postponing pain.  It’s a trick I learned very early in life as a performer and a dancer.  You can push so hard and build so much momentum that you don’t feel the pain.  You can feed off the stress, the euphoria and the inertia to just keep going and doing.  But when you stop, and you always do eventually stop – that’s when you have to face the pain.

Sometimes it’s strictly physical – like dancing for hours on blistered, bleeding toes, or doing an entire show through a screaming migraine.  And you don’t feel a thing until the applause has subsided and you’re on your way home for the night.  Then – WHAM! (Not the 80’s pop band.)  You collide with the pain that you’ve been suppressing for hours.  You ice, bandage, medicate, and ultimately curl up into a whimpering ball in bed for a few hours believing that when you wake up the next morning, it will have lessened to the point that you can function again.

Image: geocities.ws

But when the pain is on the inside, it’s a different ballgame.  You can push it off for longer.  What – it’s starting to hurt?  Turn on your go-to music playlist.  A tickle of depression? Recite a mantra while putting on mascara and go out for a night with friends!  Keep over-booking.  Keep making jokes.  Keep focusing on the next thing and the next and the next…

That is, until your last shred of sanity is bare.  Until you’re sitting in your living room at 3:33pm without having accomplished anything on your To Do List, starving, but unable to commit to getting dressed and foraging for food.  Until you know the only way to get past is finally go through…

This post is not me getting through.

This post is me acknowledging that it’s time to get through.  This post is me getting back on the horse.  Back on the bicycle.  Back… to the Future!!! – by preparing to deal with the past.  

Image: moviepilot.com

I’m not the protagonist of Eat, Pray, Love.  I don’t have a bunch of money saved up to take a year off from life traveling the globe, devouring food, slurping red wine and banging three generations of B+ List actors. (Would that I did – winning Powerball ticket PLEASE!!!)

But I realize that if I want to get back on that crazy train to success that I was momentarily aboard in the not-so-distant past, I’m going to have to let myself feel the pain, pick up the pieces and move on.

I welcome your thoughts, experiences, coping strategies, words of encouragement, agreements, disagreements, and mostly, your company, as I take this journey over the next few weeks.  And of course, I understand if this is too icky, too close to home or just not your ‘thing’ right now.

Image: Neogaf.com

Grief is F*cking UGLY.  Believe me – I am one UGLY crier!!! (A fact that way too many of my friends can attest to!)  But I know I can’t and more importantly, don’t want to do this alone.

So thank you – in advance.

Hillary J.