At the direction of my RN, I started taking Lexipro. It was initially because I was experiencing frequent terminal insomnia, where I would wake up at 3 or 4am and not be able to go back to sleep, despite feeling tired. We’d tried other non-pharmaceutical interventions, but this was the one that did the trick. Finally I was sleeping until a reasonable hour and waking up feeling refreshed.

I started noticing that I felt different during the day. I no longer felt myself tensing up my abdomen, or biting my tongue, things I used to do unconsciously throughout the day. My body’s way of telling me I was stressed. I was constantly in fight-or-flight mode.

I also started catching myself having more fun in social settings. I felt like I had finally found a firm place to stand upon, within myself, from which I could radically shift the trajectory of my social life. I felt like I finally had the space to “do the work.”

I signed up for a group couching / training series through which I’ve gained access to expert guidance and a supportive community of people on different paths but with similar goals. Through that, I found a podcast that applies a spiritual lens to mental health and personal development. It’s got me thinking that I have a lot of trauma around social interaction. Trauma, as he defines it, is simply when we can’t accept what’s happening to us, and so we push the emotional content of the experience down into our subconscious rather than consciously processing it. My inability to relax led to awkwardness, which would make me feel even more uncomfortable, sometimes to the point that I would flee, physically, mentally and/or emotionally. And probably 99% of the time, it was all in my own head.

This is not about getting a better job, getting a girlfriend, more friends or closer friendships, though those are all things I want. It’s about loosing my fear of rejection, my introvert self-concept, the fear of being truly known. That said, I’ve laid out a few concrete goals by which I can measure my progress:

• Approach and talk to strangers on the street every day
• Have 5+ guy friends I hang out with regularly outside of preexisting social structures
• Go on 1+ romantic date per week¹
• Be able to entertain people for several minutes at a time at social functions
• Be able to speak in front of large groups with complete comfort

But if I’m thinking too much about “getting” these things, I get wrapped up in my own world (my ego), which makes them harder to obtain. The mental judo I have to accomplish is to focus on losing the things that prevent these things from coming to me naturally.

The tone of this post has perhaps been rather serious. It’s an important topic indeed, but “Life is far too important a thing ever to talk seriously about.”². Freed from my anxiety, I’ve been recovering the playful me that I once knew. Most of the time, I think it’s better to be fun, especially when the situation is important. Being fun doesn’t mean I don’t recognize the importance of whatever is going on, but rather it’s because I recognize the importance that I’m fully present, cracking jokes at a funeral because it’s what they wanted.

The insomnia was my subconscious' way of saying to me You have to DO something. Not killing time, staying busy, thrashing about, pondering the past, present or the unknown, but actually living, “letting the lightning… lick you with its tongue”³. Push this boulder up the hill with joy and abandon. Not sizing it up, studying its composition, planning the route, writing a blog post about it, but actually doing it.

And eventually doing it without drugs, would be nice :)

1. Unless I’m in an exclusive relationship, which I’m open to, with the right woman
2. Oscar Wilde
3. Nietzsche